


The Wanderer's Curse and the Witch of the Wind

by Curlsandcollege



Series: Broken Unbroken (Curse Universe) [1]
Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Adventure, Alternate Universe - Curses, Annette is brilliant but also an idiot, F/M, Fantastical, Magic, breaking curses, coming together out of a common bond, felix is an idiot, two cute people going on a journey together for goals self actualization and maybe love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-10
Updated: 2021-01-21
Packaged: 2021-03-09 23:20:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 7
Words: 52,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27984483
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Curlsandcollege/pseuds/Curlsandcollege
Summary: Curses are not rare in Fodlan, but Felix has been struck with one of the nastiest curses of legend- The Wanderer’s Curse.In order to stay still, or return anywhere he’s been before ever again, Felix will need to enlist the help of a Cursebreaker.He was expecting a dark and complicated trickster. Not a bubbly, overly chatty, (pretty) young woman who sings to her plants and asks way too many non-curse related questions.
Relationships: Annette Fantine Dominic/Felix Hugo Fraldarius
Series: Broken Unbroken (Curse Universe) [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2177529
Comments: 131
Kudos: 123





	1. The Wanderer's Curse

It began with an unshakable sense of dissatisfaction. Nothing was right. 

His hour at the training grounds became two, then three, and still his gut told him it was all pointless. Felix had more energy than he’d ever had in his life, but nothing he could do would shake it.  
  
He took to hunting instead. Out in the woods with a bow his shoulders could loosen a bit, he could breathe easier, sit still long enough for something to come along. But that couldn’t last forever.  
  
Felix was the son of a duke, an advisor to the king besides. He couldn’t simply spend his days with a bow in hand, searching for deer or rabbits. He scared them off these days, having trouble finding the stillness the woods required. Approaching home from a day out wandering filled him with a new kind of dread. Novel, given the dread home already imbued in him.  
  
This was less specific. More all encompassing.  
  
“Felix stop fidgeting. It’s unbecoming.” Rodrigue’s voice sounded from across his study. Felix gripped his leg, squeezing as tightly as he could to stop the restless shaking that he just couldn’t seem to quash.  
  
Felix nodded, trying his best to take a breath, utilize everything he’d ever learned about patience and stealth. Instead his fingers began tapping on the table, providing only a smidgen of relief.  
  
“Felix!” Rodrigue smacked the table and Felix jumped. He tried to save his dignity, rising from the table and circling the room with his hands pulling at his hair in frustration.  
Pacing didn’t even help these days.  
  
Nothing helped. 

  
“I don’t know what’s wrong. It’s… Agh” His sentence trailed off into a groan of frustration.  
  
“You are not a child, I know you find this work boring but you need to _sit still_ and _pay attention._ It is your responsibility,”  
  
“As your heir, I know father. I just… Would you believe me if I said I can’t control it?” Felix was going to wear a hole in the carpet from his endless pacing at this rate.  
  
“Felix stand still. That’s an order.” Something in Rodrigue’s tone made Felix more nervous than he usually was with the man.  
  
Felix stopped in his tracks, feeling his shoulders rise up to meet his ears and his stomach clench. He needed to move, he needed _something._  
  
“Stop tapping your foot.”  
  
He hadn’t even realized he was doing it. Still, as he pressed his foot solidly into the floor, feeling the heel of his boot, his fingers started going again.  
  
Rodrigue’s face steeled into something disturbingly stoic- The face he used in political dealings, calculating as his eyes trailed over Felix’s bouncing form.  
  
“How long has this been going on?” Rodrigue asked quietly, as if he were coaxing a wounded animal.  
  
Felix took the question as permission to keep moving and resumed his pacing. The window felt better, he began tracing the pattern cast by the window on the floor with his feet. “A while. A moon or so? It’s worse today.”  
  
“Suddenly worse today or gradually?”  
  
Felix cast his mind back. He’d returned from his last mission with the king and things had felt normal. Felix was a restless person, he channeled his energy into physical pursuits- it wasn’t odd for him to be on edge for a week after returning to Fraldarius. But this time he didn’t settle into complacency or routine. Felix was a spring tightly coiled, and he felt on the edge of snapping.  
  
“Gradually. It was manageable until recently.”  
  
Rodrigue often disapproved of Felix’s methods, schedule, ideals or lack thereof. They famously did not get along. But he was still Felix’s father, and there was some measure of familial love deep down under the layers of resentment and misunderstanding.  
  
So the gravity felt particularly heavy as he explained, “Son. I think you’ve been cursed.” 

* * *

Curses were not particularly rare in Fodlan. If one interacted with mages enough, either politically or on the battlefield, it was considered an inevitability that some way or another they would end up cursed.  
  
Curses ranged, of course, in their severity and effectiveness. Felix’s older brother Glenn was afflicted by a curse of nonviolence- he could neither defend himself nor command others to in his stead. It cost him his inheritance- Fraldarius was a military house at its core. He’d been forced to relinquish his knighthood.  
  
Glenn was married now, in love with his wife Ingrid, a doting father, and fully engrossed in using the vast financial resources of Fraldarius to revitalize Galatea’s agriculture. His curse hadn’t ruined his life, merely changed it.  
  
The costs for breaking such a curse were too vast- bloody and treasonous. Curse breaking was private business, and a dangerous one.  
  
In Faerghus men did not break their curses. They lived with them as a mark of honor. Were you really so distinguished in battle if no mage took the time to curse you?  
  
Felix found the whole thing rather obscene. He did not run headlong at spellcasters on a battlefield but avoided them all together. Why risk losing everything for something as stupid as honor?  
  
Battle curses were usually innocuous. Bad vision. Nightmares. Sweaty palms.  
  
Felix’s own father had taken on a curse as a squire that made him slow of foot. He learned to ride a warhorse and returned to his place at the late king’s side. Most curses were like that. Inconvenient but not ruinous.  
  
Curses such as Glenn’s were more insidious, dangerous. They took real talent and planning, and a true power source to cast. They were incredibly rare. Glenn garnered a type of respect from others because someone took the time to curse him so deviously.  
  
Felix always knew a curse would be inevitable. He just wasn’t expecting one so… life ruining. 

* * *

  
  
“The Wanderer's curse. That is a nasty piece of work Lord Fraldarius.” The royal physician really didn’t need to sound so pleased as he concluded his examination.  
  


“The curse of who?” Felix asked, unsure he heard correctly. At least in Fhirdiad he could sit still once again. The restlessness that plagued him at home had relaxed for a moment. It was still there, Felix could feel the bowstring inside him tensing oh so slowly. He looked out the window of the infirmary and his mind mapped three different paths out of the city. He wouldn’t stay long, he had responsibilities at home. There was a swords tournament he was planning on winning in Gautier in a few weeks time, he’d been too distracted to practice as of late.  
  
He went to Fhirdiad at his father’s behest. If Felix was cursed, and it was the only explanation that made any sense at all, then he’d need to understand what it was to work with it. If the palace had no explanation, then he’d seek out the experts at the School of Sorcery.  
  
If they had no explanation he was, quite frankly, screwed.  
  
“The Wanderer. It’s common in storybooks, but I haven’t seen it since- well, I haven’t seen it in a decade at least. Nasty, you must have really pissed some mage off- this kind of work requires planning.”  
  
“I haven’t. I don’t think I have.” Felix tried to explain, mind trying to think back to any mages he knew. His heart started beating quickly. One mage. There was the one. But she hadn’t known he was coming, she couldn’t have planned for him. Not the way she would need to for such an effective curse. 

* * *

  
  
He told the king the next night, when he could finally get him alone. Dimitri’s private chambers had always been one of Felix’s favorite places in the palace, wide open windows, decorative swords adorning the walls. The eyes of the rest of the world were explicitly forbidden on grounds of treason.  
  
“Oh Felix, I’m so sorry.” Dimitri’s eye cast downward and he almost went in for a hug, but thankfully thought better of it at Felix’s tension. Dimitri was touchy and it always annoyed Felix. Why take up so much space and then try to take more? Kings…  
  
Felix tried to drink his spice blend but couldn’t stop stirring the cup. The movement of the amber liquid was soothing, but the clink of the spoon had to be annoying everyone. Oh well. He was among what counted as friends. 

  
“For what Boar?” Felix said dismissively. 

‘  
Dimitri didn’t even flinch at the nickname anymore. Just placed his head in his hands, “It’s rather my fault, don’t you think?”  
  
Felix rolled his eyes. Dimitri always took things too personally for a king. People died. People were cursed. It happened when one was keeping the realm safe. Far worse things had happened in Dimtiri’s name. Even worse by his own hand.  
  
Felix finally calmed his hands enough to take a sip. His mind flew elsewhere, Spice Blend was made in the south. It would taste better there. Refocusing on what was happening in front of him he tried to assuage Dimitri. A distracted king was no good to anyone. “I’m the one who killed her. I got her curse. It’s… I’ll be fine.”  
  
“What are you going to do?” Dimitri’s guilt was palpable and Felix remembered for a moment why they were friends despite the mountain of reasons not to be.  
  
“Wander, apparently.” Felix said flatly.  
  
Dimitri couldn’t even smile at his sarcasm.  
  
The Wanderer's curse was straightforward. Felix couldn’t be still. He couldn’t settle. If he stayed somewhere too long he’d be consumed physically and mentally until he left. He’d lasted in Fraldarius while the curse took hold, but it was clearly inside him now. 

  
He’d have a week at most in Fhirdiad, then even less time as the days passed.  
  
There was no returning for a wanderer. He’d lose his way, be waylaid, get distracted, or forget where he was going. His only option, for the rest of his life, would be pointless circles of the globe.  
  
Felix tried not to feel disappointed as he resolved himself to his curse. It could be worse. He could have Glenn’s fate. Dimitri’s. “My father always told me I’d be a better mercenary than duke. I’ll manage.”  
  
“Felix you… You can’t live like that. I won’t allow it.” The righteousness coming off of Dimitri was sickening.  
  
“Fine. Thank you for your permission. I’ll take that under advisement. Do curses respond to royal decrees?”

“No. But... if there’s anything I can do to help. Money, resources, assistance. Whatever you require, I will provide. I’ll write you letters of introduction at least, so you can move freely.”  
  
“Do not get in the habit of promising anyone cursed in your name relief. You’ll bankrupt the country.” Still advising, even now. Well, Felix supposed, he wouldn’t be able to do much of that anymore either.  
  
“I don’t. I offer as a friend. Just one with more resources than most. Where are you going next?”  
  
“I don’t know. Around. It doesn’t really matter where I go now does it?”  
  
Dimitri frowned but stayed silent. He seemed angry, perhaps he was trying to hold his temper. His outbursts had consequences far worse than anything Felix was dealing with.  
  
Felix acquiesced, granting the king, his friend, a little honesty. Not like he’d be easy to find, not where he was going.  
  
“I’m looking for a cursebreaker.”  
  
Dimitri broke his teacup, the pieces scattering to the table. “A cursebreaker? But Felix that’s-”  
  
“Foolish? Sacrilegious? Cowardly? Please, tell me more.” Right. This is why he didn’t tell Dimitri things. Forgiveness, never permission with him. He’d learned that as a child.  
  
“No just… That’s very dangerous.”  
  
“I’m aware.” Felix managed. Dimitri began to gather up pieces of his cup, stacking them neatly into a pile.  
  
Dimitri continued his righteous lecture, “Felix cursebreakers dabble in the darkest magics. They're tricksters of the highest degree.”  
  
“Well what would you have me do? Sit and take my curse like a man? You’ll have no advisor. My father will have no heir. Ugh, he’ll take sick pride in it. A family, two sons lost to curses for the crown’s sake. How devoted we are.”  
  
Felix had a choice, and neither option was very good. Either he could learn to live with his curse, wander endlessly and alone.  
  
Or he could find a cursebreaker.  
  
The answer seemed obvious to him. Felix couldn’t stand to sit still and let things happen when he could act. Especially now.  
  
Felix lasted a week at the palace before his feet began steering him anywhere but his room at night.  
  
The curse was done with this place. It was time to get moving.  
  
Felix said his goodbyes to the palace, to Dimitri. The moment felt weighty, painful even. If he failed this would be the last time he was here. A whole lifetime of imagining running away, and this was his fate. Cruel.  
  
Well that was the point with curses wasn’t it?  
  
As he walked through the threshold a hand clapped him on the shoulder. Dedue, Dimitri’s retainer loomed over him. They’d hardly exchanged two words for the duration of Felix’s visit, but he said seriously, “I have a friend at the school. I think she’ll be helpful. Go talk to Mercedes von Martiz.” 

* * *

For all the time Felix spent in Fhirdiad he had never actually been inside the School of Sorcery. True to Dimitri’s word Felix was loaded up with a dozen letters of introduction for nearly every circumstance. So when the heir to the Duke of Fraldarius arrived with a letter proclaiming he was to meet with whoever he demanded for as long as he demanded, he was rushed by a rather nervous looking mage in a dark robe to a small room marked _infirmary_ .  
  
“Oh! Sorry you’ve frightened me.” Mercedes von Martriz had short blonde hair and wore the clothes of a white mage, though they were stained with all matter of herbs. Another doctor? Was she a cursebreaker then?  
  
“Are you Mercedes?” Felix asked, searching the room for answers. It looked like every other doctor’s chambers he’d ever been in, though this one seemed to have fewer rules about food based on the basket of cookies resting on the table.  
  
She nodded and gave him a warm smile, gesturing towards a small cot placed for examinations. Felix shook his head, choosing instead to stand in the doorway. He knew what was wrong, and he was done being poked and prodded by magic users, each more convinced than the last that their research, their experience, their brilliance would explain this in a way that would make Felix anything less than resigned and miserable.  
  
She couldn’t possibly be a cursebreaker. Not here besides. Such things couldn't be accepted at an esteemed place like the School of Sorcery. Felix crossed his arms uncomfortably, trying to parse the room for its purpose. Why did Dedue send him _here_ of all places?  
  
“Would you like to sit down?” She asked, taking a seat at a small table.  
  
He would while he could he supposed. The school was too close to the palace, his mind or the curse or whatever was controlling him wasn’t satisfied here. Felix sat, and raised a hand in refusal as she pushed the cookie basket towards him.  
  
The pattern woven into the basket was vaguely familiar to him- something Adrestian in the coloring. His mind started listing several notable markets in Adrestria, places his father would import fine goods from. He wondered if they kept the best wares for themselves. He could go see for himself- He’d never seen the south ocean before.  
  
“So I take it you’re not injured.” Mercedes asked, breaking off a small piece of cookie and popping it into her mouth.  
  
“No.” 

“Well, that’s a relief then. I so rarely have anyone making social calls. I would appreciate knowing my visitor's name if it’s alright with you?”  
  
“Felix.”  
  
“It’s very nice to meet you Felix. Are- are you okay?”  
  
Felix’s leg was bouncing and he wasn’t quite used to it enough to not be embarrassed. He was so sick of this whole mess, and it hadn’t even taken full hold yet. He was always a restless person, this wasn’t so different. He jammed his heel in the floor, begging for stillness.  
  
His body disagreed.  
  
“What do you think?” He bit out.  
  
“You seem a bit anxious Felix. Can... Do you need help with that? There are some herbs and…” 

  
“No I'm not. Ugh. I’ve been in Fhirdiad a week and my body can’t bear it any longer.”  
  
“Well politics can be quite stressful-”  
  
“It’s not _politics_ I’m _cursed.”_  
  
Mercedes’ expression turned serious and her eyes settled on his still bouncing leg. “You can’t sit still.” She confirmed.  
  
“Correct.” This was pointless. Felix resolved to hide his condition from everyone he met going forward- the long sharp looks made him feel more like an object than a person.  
  
She actually smiled, “I hope you’ll pardon my directness… it’s not a Wanderer’s curse is it?”  
  
Felix actually liked her directness as far as things went. Everyone treaded lightly around him, too polite to ask what was wrong when something was so clearly off. It wasn’t as if they didn’t know, the conversation stopped in any room he entered. It was exhausting, another social dance that Felix would rather skip. It was rude, of course, to ask about someone’s curse. But Felix was rude.  
  
“What if it is?” He considered if Enbarr was too big a place to head right away. If entire cities weren’t palatable for long it would be reasonable to ration them. Maybe Fhirdiad was just too familiar though. He’d have time to try different tactics.  
  
Mercedes peered over at the door and got up to close it. Felix’s hand drifted towards his sword out of habit.  
  
“You poor thing.” The pity was unpalatable, too sweet for his constitution. Why did Dedue send him here? For vulneraries? Supplies? 

“You’re looking for a solution then?” She said quietly and Felix felt his heart skip. Did she mean a cursebreaker? Did she know one?  
  
“Would you want to live with this?” Felix tried not to shout. Mercedes began bustling around the infirmary, grabbing a small satchel off a hook on the door. Cabinets opened and closed, and she seemed to place objects at random into the bag. Books, herbs, a bag of something that smelled strongly of sugar and apples.  
  
“No. I certainly would not. I dislike exercise more than most. Wandering would simply not suit. Well… Do you have a plan of where you’re going next?” She asked innocuously, continuing her work.  
  
“I… I’ll head south before it gets cold,” and because he still had a lingering sense that she actually might be able to help him, “I’m having trouble planning ahead.”  
  
“I’m not overly familiar with the symptoms but I’ll take your word for it. If you’re in no rush to get anywhere might I suggest you stop by the Rhodos Coast. I have a delivery I need made to a friend, if you happen to find her.”  
  
Mercedes placed the bag, now stuffed full of odds and ends, on the small wooden table. Felix stared at it angrily.  
  
His mind wrapped around the Rhodos Coast and he had to stop himself from springing into action. His heart pined for the place, for the road, for the week it would take to travel on foot.  
  
He resented the relief and snapped, “I’m not a delivery boy.” 

  
“I never implied you were, Felix. Just… Something concrete might help you focus. It’s a good ways away.”  
  
“And your friend?” Felix let the unsaid words linger in the air.  
  
 _Can she help me?_  
  
“My best friend from school. Nicest girl you’ll ever meet. She’s… Our magical areas differ quite a bit.” Curse breakers weren’t nice as far as Felix heard, but he supposed he’d never met one. Maybe Mercedes thought he was frightened. Funny. What did he have to be frightened about?   
  
Felix began picking at the strap of the bag, “And you want me to pace the coast until I find her?”  
  
“Well what else will you do?” Mercedes smiled and then burst into laughter, “No. Let me draw you a map.”  
  
She pulled a piece of parchment out from a drawer and started scribbling vague lines. “So I can’t give you an exact location but she lives in a house with a lot of weathervanes about a day’s walk inland from the coast. It’s in these woods here.” She circled a scribble.  
  
Felix clenched his fist, feeling his fingernails dig into the meat of his palm. “I can’t read that.”  
  
Mercedes looked up at him, surprised, and then she turned a little pink. “Oh I thought I did a pretty good job. Here, let’s go find a map. I don’t have one here but in case you couldn’t tell we have a pretty vast library.”  
  
Felix shouldered Mercedes’ bag and followed her out of the room. The School of Sorcery’s layout was pleasing to his mind, all winding paths and steep staircases. He felt a bit like he was traversing some kind of impossible lair. He ran his hands along the walls, the cool texture of the stones comfortable against his fingers.  
  
“Oh, wait up Felix.” Felix turned to find Mercedes nearly ten paces behind him. Well, she was nearly his height- that felt like her problem. He turned another corner and another, until huge wooden doors stopped his path. Mercedes came up behind him, “You are fast! Is that…?”  
  
“I’ve always been fast.” He stopped her. Curious people annoyed him, another reason to avoid mages. Not everything was about his stupid curse.  
  
“Well you found the library! Let’s go find a map.” She moved forward and he let her take the lead. Every inch of the room was piled with shelves upon shelves of books, with small reading tables packed into corners. In the center of the reading room there was a huge abstract sculpture laid out over a table. It was a smooth polished brass that raised and lowered, with silvery inlays cutting across.  
  
Mercedes walked around it and pointed, “There I think.”  
  
Felix dropped his gaze under the table. Were there books inside? Was it a drawer or a puzzle that opened at the right words?  
  
She grabbed his hand and pulled him around, standing right next to him, “Come on, you can’t take this one with you but I’m sure your memory will suffice, and you’ll have my map for reference. It’s an approximate anyway.”  
  
Felix stared blankly at the sculpture, trying to sense the magic. Was everything at this place a riddle?  
  
He admitted defeat, “What are you talking about?”  
  
Mercedes just smiled patiently, “So this is the coast, and here’s the main road. There’s a wooded area between the town just on the edge of Mateus,” She pointed to a blob, “And the coast. You’ll take the wooded path and you should be able to find her. Listen for the wind chimes.”  
  
Felix rubbed his eyes, trying to make sense of what she was saying. It all seemed like gibberish, trying to match up her instructions to a weird art piece.  
  
“Do you have a proper map? This one is... “  
  
Mercedes eyebrows raised and she grabbed his hand, placing it over the blobs. “You can’t see what the map says?”  
  
His fingers traced sharp contours of what his mind instantly filled in was a small metal house. He looked up at Mercedes face, her features clear as day. “No…” he mumbled, groping along the map, feeling roads and trees that his eyes couldn’t translate.  
  
“I… I don’t think a map is going to help you very much, is it?” She said gently.

The realization sent a chill through his spine and he swallowed thickly. A map. The sculpture was a map, and apparently a very detailed one at that.  
  
“No.” 

* * *

The first day on the road Felix was too relieved to think of much at all. His mood lightened, and energy became manageable- no nervous tapping or shaking. He could hunt without scaring off prey. He could sneak past bandits without his fingers or feet giving him away.  
  
It imbued a sense of rightness that he once only found from dueling. Even drawing his sword, running through a few drills against a tree before he settled in for the night didn’t feel half so good as the air on his face, and the dirt underneath his boots.  
  
Why would he want to go home? Back to a desk and politics and endless stupid responsibilities? Wasn’t this better? He slept well each night, felt at peace each day. It was wrong. Painfully wrong to try to squeeze himself into any other role. Felix always loved the outdoors, long hunts, marches on missions for Dimitri. He was a loner by nature, who had friends out of history and convenience rather than any sort of effort he put into maintaining relationships with others. 

  
He was going to find Mercedes’ friend to deliver a package. Then follow the coast down, maybe head east through the southern Kingdom. 

  
It took him three days to start feeling disconcerted in his joy. Felix was many things, but overwhelming happiness was foreign even in the best of circumstances.  
  
He reached into his pack to find his bedroll and brushed over Mercedes’ satchel. His stomach dropped.  
  
Mercedes’ friend, the cursebreaker.   
  
The curse. Of course. Felix let one shout of anger and threw his bag to the ground. His own mind was tricking him, trying to make him forget.  
  
Every new thing Felix learned about his stupid affliction made it seem worse, more impossible by the day. He’d been cursed hardly a few weeks by his most likely guess (his only guess), and it was rapidly getting worse.  
  
Despite his anger, he slept well. The walking exhausted him in a way that felt well earned and he woke each morning refreshed. Ready for another day.  
  
Felix avoided the town entirely. He’d yet to try to revisit a place but the court physician had made that part clear- it wouldn’t be good. As long as his supplies were in good repair, he could do everything on his own.  
  
Even without a map, and going nearly a day without a road, Felix felt like he had a good sense of where the coast was. He looked up at the thick trees surrounding him but something told him he was close. 

  
He’d be strategic, sweep the forest in directions until he hit the road.  
  
Without a path that was easier said than done, but still, he knew what way west was from the sun in the sky and a certain surety in the back of his mind. It would take him a few days to find her, most likely, these woods were thick as mud. He stopped in a small clearing and began picking at his lunch, some leftover rabbit from the night before.  
  
He could eat nothing but meat on the road unless he stopped at an inn. His younger self would be thrilled.  
He shook the thought from his head, biting into the unseasoned, overcooked skewer. He tried to hate the rubbery texture. Remind himself of how much better food could be if spicy- 

Almyra had spicy foods, his memory reminded him. No- not the point.  
  
Appetite satiated Felix tried to center himself. He closed his eyes and began counting breaths, feeling his lungs expand, imaging air at his fingertips, his toes, the top of his head.  
  
A small tinkling noise distracted his thoughts. It was coming from the south and he remembered Mercedes’ words- wind chimes. He was looking for weathervanes and wind chimes.  
  
He followed the noise and felt it get louder and clearer. Not one chime, a whole cacophony of chimes all different sizes and materials. Loud, but somehow relaxing.  
  
He spotted a house with a large weathervane on top, and another at each corner. There was a large fenced in yard overgrown with plants packed into neat rows.  
  
Reason, in the chaos.  
  
He approached the fence quietly, and his ears picked up a different sound, more consistent than the chimes.  
  
“ _Chick, chick, chickpeas, all in rows. Chick, chick, chickpeas, grow grow grow.”_  
  
“Excuse me” he said loudly enough that he hoped she could hear.  
  
“ _All your vines are nice and long, all your plants are big and strong,”_

  
“I don’t mean to interrupt.” He tried again, leaning against her fence.  
  
“ _So many meals both hearty and sweet, fix you up and then I_ \- Agh!" A shock of red hair peeked up over a bush and Felix jumped back at her scream.  
  
“Who are you? How dare you sneak up on me like this?” It was a woman’s voice that demanded his answers.  
  
“I… I tried to announce myself. Just the chimes and the singing-”  
  
“What singing?” She started to turn red and Felix realized two things.  
  
The first, there was wind pulling towards her fingertips.  
The second, she was probably one of the prettiest women he’d ever seen in his life.  
  
Trying his best to avoid being on the painful end of a wind spell he raised his hands up, “Mercedes sent me. I have something for you.”  
  
The wind died suddenly and Felix could hear his heart pound in his ears as the chimes stopped.  
  
The redhead smiled, “Oh! Well why didn’t you say so? Please come in, I’m Annette.”


	2. Trust

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trust is not like fish stew and Annette is not at all who Felix was expecting.

Annette’s home had no business being as comfortable as it felt. The week of travel grounded Felix, and while his body was seemingly immune to the type of physical exhaustion travel typically brought he couldn’t help but settle into an armchair once Annette shoved him into it.  
  
Shoved.  
  
Him.  
  
Well, he supposed there was a level of aggressiveness that came with the territory of cursebreaking. He assumed.  
  
As far as he could tell everything he thought he knew about the field was wrong.  
  
For the past week his mind filled in the details of a sinister laboratory. Smoking cauldrons, awful smells, distant screams.  
  
Annette’s home smelled like baking bread and every moment of silence was interrupted by the faint sound of the windchimes outdoors. How anyone could sleep with that racket was beyond him. Nearly every surface was covered in something- a knit doily, a blanket, a jar full of herbs.  
  
More than anything the home contained books. Wall to wall, shelves stuffed, piled eight high on the floor. Her bed was covered in orderly stacks of books- a small wooden doll rested on the sliver of blue bedspread left clear. 

“You must be starving! You look like you’ve been in the woods for days- did you have trouble finding me? I really must thank Mercedes, I was running low on supplies. She always knows just when I need more apple blend- bless her.” Annette was practically running around her cottage, unpacking the satchel bit by bit. There was clearly a system, but Felix stopped trying to follow it ten minutes ago.  
  
She’d been chattering the whole time. About tea and chimes and absolutely nothing at all. Felix usually hated people who worked through ideas with their mouths open, but Annette’s mind wove in ways that kept him hanging on her words.  
  
Maybe it was the isolation- she probably didn’t have many visitors. Maybe he’d think like that one day. No, bad thoughts. He was here- surely a solution wasn’t far behind.  
  
“I don’t want to impose.” He said, mentally smacking himself. He _did_ want to impose. That was why he came all this way.  
  
“Here- I’ve made some fish stew and I’ll consider it an insult if you don’t partake.” Annette stood with her hands on her hips, making a face that was probably supposed to be anger but reminded Felix more of the cats that prowled Fraldarius castle.  
  
He bent over backwards for the cats too. Which is to say, Felix found himself having lunch with a cursebreaker.  
  
“I didn’t catch your name.” Annette asked between bites of the first decent food Felix had since leaving Fhirdiad.  
  
“Felix,” he answered. What was the protocol here? Did he just… ask her to break his curse? Could she just snap her fingers and free him?  
  
“Nice to meet you. Sorry about before I just… Can’t ever be too careful out here alone, you know?”  
  
“You seem pretty capable to me.” He’d never really interacted socially with wind mages before, too chaotic. Wind _hurt_ , cutting sharper than swords while also knocking you off your feet.  
  
Annette shrugged and smiled up at him. She did that a lot, smiling. 

  
As far as smiles went she had a nice one, terribly sincere, and she had one dimple on her left cheek and something about that was incredibly endearing to Felix.  
  
He shook the thought from his mind. The curse again, trying to protect itself by distracting himself with how _pretty_ Annette was. Not her rumored skillset. He wouldn’t let his curse win today. Not when he was seemingly making progress.  
  
“So are you a student of Mercedes? You don’t look like a mage, though hmm,” She reached out for his hand and studied it, “You do have a writing callus. But you’re clearly a sword user from the roughness here.” Annette ran her fingers over the lines of his palm as if that were a perfectly normal thing to do. Felix swallowed, frozen in place by the touch.  
  
“So either you’re a mage, but I don’t think you are, or you’re a nobleman. Which is it?”  
  
Felix dropped his gaze to their entwined hands, “Nobleman. I’m a Fraldarius.” 

  
Annette pulled her hand back to her chest, “Okay, good to know. So how did Mercedes rope you into coming to deliver a package to me? She usually sends a student if she can’t come herself.”  
  
Was Annette playing him or was she really that thick? Or maybe she wasn’t a cursebreaker at all and this was all some elaborate joke to play on his need to keep moving. Maybe Wanderers were a network of couriers used by mages to do their bidding.  
  


“I uh… I’m here to inquire about your… uh… services.” Felix asked, feeling terribly awkward about the whole situation. Was there etiquette with cursebreakers? Nobody ever told him.  
  
“Oh! Well why didn’t you say so? What’s wrong then?” Annette asked, completely unphased at his request. Her vision turned sharper, more evaluating. She kept shoving spoonfuls of soup into her mouth.  
  
“I uh… I’m cursed.”  
  
“Well yeah, obviously. Do you know which curse? I can help discern the symptoms if you don’t but, well people usually know if they come to me. Or don’t. Well… It’s complicated. I assume it’s complicated.”  
  
“I have the Wanderer’s curse.” Felix said simply.  
  
Annette’s eyes bugged impossibly wide and she lit up like a beacon, “Oh that’s _wonderful_!”  
  
Felix was taken aback, of all of the reactions he was expecting outright excitement was perhaps last on the list. His jaw dropped and he wasn’t sure if he should be offended or not.  
  
Annette read his reaction and she turned a little red. “Oh. Well. Sorry. No that’s not what I meant. Um. Terrible curse. You have my sympathy.”  
  
“I don’t really want sympathy to be fair.” Felix said, taking another spoonful of stew to buy himself time to stop _alienating_ the only person who could help him.  
  
“No I suppose not. I just meant um… It’s a curse I’m really interested in on um… an intellectual level I guess. Sorry I didn’t mean to be rude.” Annette’s tone was suddenly more careful, and Felix’s cursory grasp on social cues told him he was losing ground with her quickly.  
  
“We’re talking about curses- technically the whole nature of the conversation is rude.”  
  
She huffed, “Well I guess to your mind it would be.” She took two more bites, studying him as she ate, “Okay. Curse breaking. Do you mind if I ask you some questions? Standard procedure.”  
  
He did actually, but either way he found himself saying, “Yeah. Sure.”   
  
“How long have you had the curse?”  
  
Since that mission with Dimitri. “A moon or two I think.”  
  
“And you’re having difficulty remaining in place? Constant wandering thoughts? Restlessness?”  
  
He nodded, but realized he was sitting perfectly content at her table eating lunch. So he added, “It’s a little better today.”  
  
“Well you’ve traveled recently if you’re here. As far as I’ve read, travel will grant you a bit of reprieve. Not moons, mind you, days at most. It will get worse.”  
  
“I’m noticing that.”  
  
“And do you know how to break it?”  
  
Felix stared at her, raising a skeptical eyebrow, “Obviously not.”  
  
She huffed out again and now Felix was absolutely sure she was angry, “Don’t give me that look, this is standard procedure. Most people know the conditions for breaking their own curses. Not always- clearly. Have you tried to think through a solution?”  
  
“You.” He said blankly.  
  
“Ahh. Oh. Wow. Um.” She let out a little laugh, “Well I’m a last resort. Come. Let’s go to the river. See if you can figure it out.”  
  
“Why the river? Is there some magical property to it?”  
  
“No but your leg is shaking and I have a feeling being outside will help you think better.”  
  
Felix let his leg keep going, deciding that if she was _interested_ in his curse then she could see just how awful it was. She eyed him but kept speaking. 

  
“There’s some variety with Wanderers’ curses. Most haven’t ever really seen one, just read about them. Storybooks can be helpful starting places for things like this but details do get exaggerated over time. I have a list of the stories somewhere around here. Are you done with that?” Annette grasped for his now empty bowl.  
  
“Yeah. Thank you. It was good. One of my favorites, actually.” He usually liked to top it with imported spices from Dagda, but he wouldn’t be so spoiled as to bring that up. For one second his heart missed home, missed the cook who’d been with the family for years and took Felix’s tastes as a personal challenge.  
  
Annette smiled, “Me too! Funny coincidence. I must have known you were coming.” 

“So uh… have you ever seen the curse before?” He asked. She had an _academic_ interest in it. Maybe she was the world’s foremost expert on Wanderers and he’d be back home bored out of his mind within a week. 

  
“Yours? Well. No. Um. Sort of? Hard to find a Wanderer by your nature. But come! Let’s see if you have your own answers. You seem capable!” 

* * *

Felix never really liked the concept of " _T_ _he solution was inside you all along.”_ As a child he’d complain to Glenn when stories ended that way. It was never really satisfying to Felix’s mind. Why not break the curse from the get go then? Glenn would laugh and say, “You’ll get it one day.”  
  
He still didn’t. 

  
Annette donned a straw sunhat as they started walking through the woods, and the wide brim almost eclipsed the width of her shoulders. It was the kind of thing that was fashionable years ago, Felix remembered dodging them in the streets of Fhirdiad right after he finished Officers school. It never looked as good on anyone as it did Annette.  
  
They walked for a few minutes in silence before Annette piped up again, “So Felix, another standard question, do you know who cursed you? Because you seem kind of vague on the details and really if it’s a curse like this you’d think you know who did it.”  
  
Felix frowned and shoved his hands into his pockets trying to avoid the question, the distant sound of chimes faded as the trees thickened, and suddenly they were very alone with the question still lingering between them.   
  


“It’s private.” Felix was not quite sure how to unravel the layers of complexity of exactly why and how he’d been cursed. It didn’t just involve him. There were bigger factors at play, ones far harsher than his own fate.  
  
Annette looked sympathetic, “I understand privacy. But um… Curses are personal business. If it helps I will keep anything you tell me an absolute secret. Not that I’d really have anyone to tell,” She laughed nervously, gesturing to the empty woods.  
  
That wasn’t all that reassuring. “Is there some kind of cursebreaker code or something?”  
  
Annette smiled at that, “No but there is an Annette code! You already have dirt on me of course.”  
  
“Your location? Mercedes gave that out pretty freely.”  
  
“My…? No. My songs. You heard me singing to my plants and I’d _really_ like you to forget that if you could.”  
  
He absolutely could not. It was too cute. It would be stuck in his head until he died.  
  
“You need to trust me a little if this is going to work.” Annette said with a frustrated finality at his silence.   
  
She said trust as if that were something Felix could just share like a bowl of fish stew. Like he could take one look at her face and decide that her eyes were definitely blue and not grey, and blue was more trustworthy. That because her home was covered in books and herbs that smelled mysterious and comforting all at once that he would let his guard down. 

  
The secrets weren’t his to share. On the other hand, Dimitri’s words echoed in his mind- whatever he could do to support Felix’s quest, he would provide.  
  
What was airing a bit of royal dirty laundry to one woman?  
  
“How much do you need to know?” Felix asked quietly, already swallowing the resentment at needing to tell her anything at all.  
  
“Well… Let’s start with the thing you’re avoiding- Who cursed you?” Annette kept pace as Felix walked, occasionally taking a little hop step to transverse an obstacle or close a gap that his longer legs created. She grabbed his arm for balance a few times. Much as she seemed to have an affinity for wind, dirt wanted her- badly.  
  
Annette didn’t make sense. Cursebreakers were tricksters and darkness who went at the heart of the ugliest magics and came out victorious. How did she end up with that power? What would have even made a woman so… sunshiney pursue that path?  
  
Felix half apologized to Dimitri as he started the tale, “There was a woman named Cornelia. She used to serve the late king as an advisor. She was a healer and then… well she did more hurting than healing.”  
  
Annette nodded, encouraging him on.  
  
“She betrayed the royal family. She destroyed a lot of lives. Killed a lot of people. She disappeared for years, but recently we got some intel that she’d resurfaced. She was active again. And planning something.” That was hardly half of it.  
  
Still, he could tell her this part, “I was sent to take care of her, and she cursed me.”  
  
Annette tapped her finger to her lips, considering his story.  
  
“Well if she worked for the king she was probably powerful enough to cast the curse. Did you see her do it?”  
  
Felix shook his head. “No but it had to be her.” There was no one else.   
  
Annette frowned, and then grasped for Felix’s chin. She turned his face from side to side, peering into his eyes. He tried to look up, away from her. At last she let him go and Felix stumbled back.  
  
“What are you doing Annette?” 

“Sorry! Sorry. I’m just… Can you talk about it or are you just purposely being vague?” She asked, circling her fingers together.  
  
“I can talk about it.” Felix said.  
  
“Are you _sure_? Sometimes people can’t. That’s okay too. If you can talk, I need more than that. Did she have it out for you? Did you hurt her?”  
  
Felix cocked his head, “I killed her.” 

  
Annette nodded eagerly, “Oh that’s good! Easier to break curses from dead mages, the magic doesn’t stick the same.”  
  
“It stuck fine.” Felix mumbled.  
  
Her moods made Felix’s head spin, happy at the oddest things, but in the same breath so serious. Annette laughed “I meant if you’d hurt her _before_ she cursed you. The Wanderer’s curse demands preparation to cast, power. She couldn’t just do it willy nilly.”  
  
“How do you know so much about how curses are cast?” Felix asked defensively. It wasn’t like it was taught standard in mage school.  
  
Annette seemed annoyed at his question, “What do you think? If one is to break them you need to understand how they’re formed. But back to the story Felix. You didn’t see her cast it, but you think she did, and you killed her so it’s not like she did it retroactively. So what did she do that makes you think it was her?” 

Felix felt himself begin to sweat. Shit. This was exactly what he _didn’t_ want to tell her, the kind of information that would be more trouble than it was worth.  
  
“You swear you won’t tell anyone anything about my curse? You won’t write some long winded academic paper about Wanderers only half obscuring the detail?”  
  
Annette let out a shout and burst into laughter. “Oh. No. Felix! On my honor and my magic, your secrets are safe with me.” 

Felix took a deep sigh, waiting for Annette to gather herself. She had a nice laugh, as far as loud honking laughs went. It didn’t make him trust her _less_ .  
  
“I wasn’t alone. My uh, friend and I were hunting Cornelia down together. Cornelia said that some other mage had already come up with a much funnier solution to deal with my friend. And then she looked at me and shrugged and said, “ _Whoops, it bounced. Enjoy your journey.”_ I didn’t think anything of it until after I couldn’t stay still.”  
  
They walked in silence as Annette worked through the pieces of his story. Rushing water began to sound in the distance and Felix remembered they had a destination in mind.   
  
The river was mellow, barely five feet across and clear and shallow enough that Felix could see the bottom. It was certainly pretty and private. Maybe Annette needed to come out here to not be distracted by her dozens of books and chimes and whatever else she packed into her cottage.  
  
Annette sat down on the edge, pulling Felix to do the same.  
  
“So your friend has already been cursed?” Annette clarified.  
  
“Yeah.” Felix shuddered, realizing he was dancing on the edge of betrayal.  
  
She clarified in a way that made him feel less like he was under scrutiny and more like she truly wanted to know. It didn’t feel weird or uncomfortable when she asked, and somehow that felt more dangerous. “And whatever he had is apparently worse than your own?”  
  
“It’s a curse of violence.” Felix said quickly. He shouldn’t have told her that.  
  
Annette’s shock quickly turned into worry, and she opened her mouth a few times to start to comment before setting on a simple, “Oh.”  
  
“Yeah.” Felix said bitterly.  
  
“That’s a _really_ bad one.” Annette commented darkly. 

“You have no idea.”

“And he doesn’t want it broken?” For once her reaction made sense. She’d been excited at his curse, but Violence was apparently too gruesome for even her to have an _academic_ interest.  
  
“It’s tied to another’s curse of nonviolence. He can’t break it without-”  
  
“Killing the other. Yikes. Well. Thankfully I don’t think yours is like that.” She gave him a reassuring pat on the shoulder. 

  
Well wasn’t that a relief? One possible cursebreaking method off the table at least. 

* * *

Glenn and Dimitri were tied together with opposing curses, bestowed in a mostly failed coup years before. A coup Cornelia orchestrated, though she was too busy taking care of _other_ members of the royal family to curse Dimitri herself.  
  
Glenn got Dimitri out alive, but they both suffered for it. 

  
It annoyed Felix to see Glenn so content when his life had been stolen out from under him. Especially given what Rodrigue suggested in the fallout. If his curse came up Glenn would turn to Ingrid and say she was strong enough to protect them both, that he would run away from a thousand battles just to have her. It was gross. They were terribly in love.  
  
Dimitri’s curse was far worse. Violence was true to its name. Dimitri could only fight utilizing brutal, endless bloodlust with no remorse or control. He was nothing more than an animal once he got started. He’d delegated to the knights as often as he could. Nobody wanted to follow a king who was hardly a man some of the time so Dimitri’s condition was a closely held secret. 

  
Dimitri’s desire for revenge against Cornelia was deemed an important enough reason to take the risk. Felix joined him even though he wasn’t a knight, even though it was risky. Felix was one of the fastest men in Fodlan, and he wasn’t the type to fight to the bitter end if his heart wasn’t in it. Felix would run if Dimitri wasn’t sated by avenging his father. In the end Dimitri hadn’t even needed to swing his lance, Felix cut her down where she stood. 

  
The look of disappointment on Dimitri’s face haunted Felix.

* * *

“I don't think I know how to break it, do you?” Felix asked, dreading whatever the answer might be.  
  
“Not yet. So impatient. So this Cornelia, do you know what kind of magic she used?”  
  
“Uh… Dark magic I guess?” He wasn’t sure. “She hit me with one spell before I got her and it just felt… All the moonlight centered on me and then everything was black and cold. But not like ice magic and not like that um, the life sucking one…”  
  
“Nosferatu.” She provided.  
  
“Yeah. It felt like Dark magic.” Felix explained.   
  
“It sounds like it. So she was drawing power from the moon- that’s interesting. Very possibly her source then- that’s vital information for your curse.”  
  
This sounded like the worst possible news. “So you’re saying I’m going to have to destroy the moon?” Felix asked wearily.  
  
Annette laughed for a few seconds before realizing, “Oh you’re serious. No. Nothing like that. Well… It depends. But not the moon itself. Nothing so dramatic.”  
  
As far as Felix was concerned curses were very dramatic things. As were cursebreakers as it turned out. At least his cursebreaker.  
  
“So we have a likely caster and type of magic. So what I want you to do Felix is really engage with your curse. I can tell you’ve been trying to suppress it since you arrived, right?”  
  
Felix nodded. Even calmed as it was today, there was a voice in the back of his mind begging him to go.  
  
“Great. Now if there’s a vital location, a person, an object, anything at all, your curse can’t really hide that from you. It can try to distract you, but I want you to think down to the essence of your curse. Where does it want you to go?” 

The whole thing sounded stupid to Felix. His curse wanted him to go everywhere. He held his tongue, she was the expert.  
  
Annette arranged herself sitting across from him on the side of the river. “Close your eyes, get comfortable, and just let your mind wander.” 

He gave her one last skeptical look and closed his eyes.  
  
For the first few moments he couldn't help but survey everything around him. The feel of the grass under him. Annette was radiating warmth. His swords pressed at an awkward angle. He could hear birds overhead and the ever persistent rush of the river.  
  
The birds brought him back to her little song- she probably had others if she had lyrics about something as mundane as chickpeas.  
  
Not useful. He tried to focus, let the river calm his thoughts.   
  
All once his mind cast out. The river ran to the ocean on the Rhodos Coast. There was a Western Church temple there that was fairly famous for its architecture. He should go there, see it for himself. Sylvain would be jealous, he liked that sort of thing. Art. History.  
  
Sylvain. Right. Stuck up in Gautier with his terrible family. He was hosting a swords tournament that Felix was sure to win if he could show up. It would probably take him a full week and a half to get there - He’d miss the tournament. Damn. But then that would leave Gautier open for another time.  
  
So where else could he go? The Southern Church was nothing more than ruins these days, Adrestia was a secular country and those who worshiped tended to take pilgrimage to Garreg Mach for larger festivals.  
  
Garreg Mach, ugh, he’d done his year there and left quickly. No interest there. The curse didn’t seem to like it either. Too boring. Rather than planning an itinerary it simply pushed his thoughts further north once again.   
  
He had papers, he could cross borders if he wished. Sreng had a common language with Fodlan, he could probably get lost there for a while. Almyran cuisine was one of Felix’s favorites, spiced and flavorful. Tea too. It was supposed to be one of the biggest countries on the continent. He could explore there and never get bored. He didn’t speak the language but he didn’t speak much anyway. He’d learn a phrase or two and probably be fine. “Water.” “Please” “Thank you” “How much does this cost?”  
  
Felix’s eyes opened, and he realized he missed something, “Annette I have to pay you for this, right?”  
  
Annette jumped at his outburst, turning back around from where she had been focusing on something in the forest. Maybe she’d been napping while he _engaged with his curse_. 

“My? Oh. I mean. It depends honestly. We can figure it out.” She rambled on, somehow surprised he’d asked.  
  
“I have money.” He said plainly. She had to charge something, even if it was just for how much she seemed to know already. He was taking up too much of her time.  
  
“Yeah you mentioned you were a noble, I’m not worried. Wait, that's not the point, your curse is trying to distract you! Don’t let it win! What did your mind focus on?” She was all business again.  
  
Felix sighed. Nothing. Absolutely nothing.  
  
“Borders mostly. Sreng. Almyra. Big places where I could get lost.”  
  
“But nowhere in particular?”  
  
Felix shook his head, “Sorry to disappoint.”  
  
Annette shrugged, “It’s fine. There’s usually only one way to break a curse, but there’s a million ways to figure that out. They say Wanderers’ curses make you go any way the wind blows, so it really might be completely random where you head to next. I’ve never noticed any patterns at least.”  
  
“I thought you hadn’t seen my curse before?”  
  
Annette turned red at his question and stammered out her answer.  
  
“W-well I haven’t seen it, but you’re not the only one, you know.” Was it just him or did she seem almost angry with him again?  
  


He stood up, completely done with sitting for the day. “Right. So what’s next?”  
  
Nothing. His mind told him. Give up and move on. Felix felt his mood sink. This was stupid. Why did he think this would be easy? Why would he get to pretend that just because he wanted his curse to be broken it magically would be?  
  
As if magnetically opposed to his own, Annette’s energy brightened. She clapped her hands together in excitement. “An experiment! I wonder if you can find my home again. You lead us, I’ll follow you.”  
  
Felix extended a hand to help Annette up from the ground and she straightened her skirts before gesturing with a flourish, “Lead me home Wanderer.” 

* * *

The path to Annette’s house was less clear than he remembered. He probably just thought it was a straight shot because he had a guide before. Maybe he’d spent too much time looking at her and not the path. After walking ten minutes he closed his eyes, trying to listen for the chimes.  
  
Nothing.  
  
Felix decided he’d gone too far west. His mind was casting towards the beach before. Maybe it was steering him wrong. He looked up at the sun to orient him, east. He needed to go east.  
  
He turned direction suddenly, and Annette gasped, “You don’t know where you’re going!”  
  
“I started in the wrong direction. I’m fixing it.”  
  
Sure he was cursed but he wasn’t an idiot. He could navigate. The woods were thick, it was easy to get turned around. 

Annette let them walk another ten minutes before she stopped him with a hand on the shoulder. “Felix do you know what direction you’re walking in?” She asked gently.  
  
“East.” He said, then glanced up at the sun. “No. We were going west. I _want_ to go east. These trees are too thick, I keep losing the sun.”  
  
She gave him a hard look, “Felix which way do you think the coast is?” She asked.  
  
Felix knew immediately, “West” and he pointed, knowing exactly where it was. The Rhodos Coast was a landmark, of course he knew.  
  
“And my home?” Annette asked hopefully, seeming more encouraged. See. He was fine.  
  
“East.” He pointed. Something felt off. He looked up at the sun again. “Your house is east.” He said, feeling a little less sure than he should have.  
  
“That’s right.” Annette said slowly, reaching her hand out to his and adjusting his direction ever so slightly. He resisted, pushing his weight against her. This was stupid.  
  
“What?” He asked bitterly.  
  
“I think I’m going to lead us now. Please stay right next to me, okay?” She instructed, as if he were a child. Felix shifted, hating himself for is failure.  
  
Maybe he should just run to the coast and dunk his head in the ocean. He’d know what way was east then.  
  
Annette studied him, and Felix wondered if he looked as uncomfortable as he felt. 

“Here” and she held out her hand.  
  
Felix stared at her. What was that for? Why did she keep _touching_ him like it was nothing?  
  
“You keep getting turned around. Stop being stubborn and trust that I know a little bit about tricking curses.”  
  
“How will holding your hand help?” He asked absolutely sure he was blushing.  
  
“You need to hold my hand because I’m going to blindfold you. Just so we can get back home. I want to do a little research, then we can head out. But I need my books for a night.” 

“Head out where?” Felix asked. Had she found something in his disjointed ramblings? 

Annette shrugged, “Not sure yet. You’ll tell me. But I’m coming with you, naturally.”

“Why?” What use would she be on the road? Felix had no need for distracting redheads if she could just tell him how to break his stupid curse. She’d slow him down.  
  


“Well aren’t you grateful? I’m a cursebreaker. I’m going to help you break your curse. Obviously.” Annette placed her hands on her hips stubbornly, seeming frustrated that he was pushing back on her.  
  
“I thought you said I’d need to find my own solution.” Felix pointed out.  
  
“Ugh. Faerghans. You’ll get it faster with my help. Curses are... Just. Look. A lot of the symptoms are made to disorient you so think of me as your compass. Also won’t you be less lonely? That’s really the point of it all, the loneliness. You can’t stay still and you can’t go back. You need to go any way the wind blows, and well, I make the wind blow!” 

Felix wished she didn’t have such a good point.

He looked up at the sun again, and realized they had maybe an hour until it set completely. He’d gotten them embarrassingly lost along a straight path.   
  
Maybe help wasn’t a terrible idea.  
  
Felix held his own hand out and scrunched his eyes shut, “Fine. See. I trust you. We’ll talk about you coming along tomorrow.” 

Annette pulled a handkerchief out of her pocket and wrapped it around Felix’s eyes. “I’m glad you trust me! That will make this easier. Your inclination is going to be to fight me. But you can’t.”  
  
Felix swallowed, that sounded impossible. He’d always gone further trusting his gut than anything else. But he guessed his gut was infected now.  
  
“Distract me then.” He said, feeling Annette tighten the knot around his eyes.  
  
Annette laughed, “Fine. How?” Felix was no stranger to distractions. But there was one that had been in the back of his mind all day. 

Felix felt more than a little foolish when he requested, “Sing.”

Annette gasped and snatched her hand back from him. “Seriously? T-thats really personal you know.”  
  
“Someone really smart told me curses _are_ personal business.” He couldn’t help the smile that crossed his face. 

  
Annette sighed deeply, but then reached out for his hand again.  
  
_“If you ever feel too sleepy, just think about the sticky wicky weepy. His sharp teeth champ and chomp- dangerous beast from the swamp.”_

* * *

  
They’d walked for the better part of an hour when Felix felt the blindfold pulled off his eyes. She’d led him in looping paths then, he didn’t even realize they were close.  
  
She’d silenced the windchimes too.  
  
Maybe she really did know something about tricking curses.  
  
“There you go! We’ve done it!” Annette smiled widely, bouncing slightly as she gestured towards her cottage. She let go of his hand once they were inside the fence and Felix watched her click the gate closed.  
  
Adrenaline coursed through his body, annoyingly familiar. He wanted to run. He shouldn’t be here. She wasn’t helping him at all and led him around for an hour in the dark- probably pickpocketed him. Maybe led bandits towards them.  
  
She wasn’t helping him, she was wasting his time. He’d get worse if he stayed here, he was far more focused outside.  
  
Felix turned towards the gate and began to bolt.  
  
“FELIX!” Annette shouted, and he felt a strong gust push him straight down into the dirt. His back stung, though he could tell nothing was injured.  
  
Nothing but his pride.  
  
“So you have a returning clause then. No more backtracking for you!” Annette said brightly, as if she hadn’t just knocked him down face first.  
  
Felix let himself feel miserable for the moment and then turned over, “I guess.”  
  
Mistake, his back burned from the impact.  
  
“Great. Can you come inside?” 

Felix focused on the positives. Inside was nice. It had books and food. Rest. Annette wanted to go there. He was getting tired and she probably wouldn’t mind if he was a little jittery.  
  
He pushed himself up and brushed some of the dirt off. He walked back into the cottage with as much dignity as he could muster considering this tiny woman just bested him. 

  
No one bested him, especially mages. She probably got lucky. 

Inside felt far worse than it had that morning but it felt tolerable for the moment. The bowstring was ever tighter in his stomach, but he had a sense there was a little sand left in the hourglass.  
  
Annette served them both another helping of fish stew and pulled over a beat up black book.  
  


“I’m going to categorize every Wanderer tale, I started the project ages ago but I never had a reason to finish. Do you want to help?” She seemed excited about the whole thing, but Felix’s heart wasn’t in it.  
  
“Help how?” 

Annette listed the titles she wanted to read and he realized with a sickening turn that he’d loved some of those stories as a kid. Tons of action in those tales.  
  
Felix shook his head, feeling rude at his refusal.  
  
“I’ll leave it to the expert. I can’t really see myself quietly reading about how terrible my life’s about to be.”  
  
Annette studied him with something he desperately hoped wasn’t pity and went back to her food and her book. He’d stumped her into silence then- or maybe she was mad at him.  
  
He missed her voice.  
  
He offered to clean the dishes, looking desperately for something to keep himself occupied and Annette got to work with her reading.  
  
Felix began to rummage through his pack for some parchment. He’d sent a quick letter explaining his curse to his father back in Fhirdiad, and ended it with a final note that he’d handle it. His father wouldn’t be thrilled to hear he was cavorting with a cursebreaker, though Annette wasn’t exactly the picture most had in their minds. But his fathers opinions when it came to curses were generally terrible, so maybe he didn’t need to know.  
  
A letter would keep Rodrigue from having to name another heir in the meantime. Especially since if Felix couldn’t inherit, and Glenn couldn’t inherit, then succession fell to his uncle.  
  
No. Even if Rodrigue disagreed with his methods he’d be relieved to know that he might still have Felix. A surly unprepared heir was better than one who had forty years of jealousy built up.

  
Annette went to light more lamps, noticing Felix for the first time since she started reading  
  
“What are you working on?” She asked, pulling stacks of books off her bed.  
  
“Letter home. I won’t say too much about who you are or what we’re doing but um… I’m giving my father an update.” Felix said, trying to figure just how much detail Rodrigue deserved. 

Annette dropped a pile of books with a crash, and Felix rushed over. She was hurt, tears were streaming down her face.  
  
“Did you drop those on your foot?” He asked, trying to discern what was wrong. He helped her find a seat and knelt at her feet, trying to figure out where she’d dropped the books.   
  
Annette was quiet, and wiped the tears from her eyes. “Yeah. Uh. My foot. Sorry. I can be pretty clumsy.” She gave a hollow laugh.  
  
“Do you write letters home often?” Annette asked, swallowing thickly as she tried to stop her crying.  
  
Felix shrugged, “I don’t really get along with my family.” He tried to explain, “This will be my second I guess.”  
  
Annette laughed again. “Good to know the curse doesn’t keep you from writing.” She smiled a watery smile, and then rested her head in her hands.  
  
Felix felt as if he were invading on something immensely private, but resisted the urge to leave the house. He gave her a little pat on the shoulder, “Yeah uh… You okay?”  
  
Annette nodded and shooed him back to his letter. By the time he capped his inkwell she was up again, shifting books about.  
  
“You should take my bed. I’m going to be up late researching, so I’ll go up to the loft so I don’t disturb you.” She offered, beginning to brew a cup of a tea that smelled sickly sweet.  
  
“Where will you sleep then? I’m not taking your bed Annette.” He was starting to feel bone tired, but it felt rude to let Annette do all that work without his help. Not that he’d be much help, his leg started shaking an hour ago. At least she hadn’t commented on it.  
  
Annette smiled, “There’s a sleep space up there. I’m a little absentminded but I’m not dumb, I don’t do the ladder if I’m tired.” She shrugged, and for good measure blew some wind at the bed to fluff up the pillows.  
  
It would be the most comfortable place he slept in a week.  
  
“If you insist then.” He said, still feeling awkward about imposing in that way.  
  
“I’ll refuse to sleep if you don’t sleep there, you’ll find me perched in an armchair all night. How awkward will that be for you?” She laughed, and he appreciated how her mood seemed less melancholy once again.  
  
He liked her humor. Not his style at all, but things seemed more fun in her mind. Dramatic.  
  
Maybe that’s why she liked curses so much? She seemed to understand them far better than he did, and he actually had a curse. 

Annette’s arms were clutching a series of tomes, ones she planned to read that night? She didn't seem to have any plans to go to sleep soon. 

“Sure, uh. Thanks. Don’t want you to refuse to sleep.”  
  
Annette laughed as she began to climb the ladder into the loft. “Goodnight Felix. We’ll know more in the morning!” 

“Goodnight then.” 

Felix was a worrier by nature. He spent most of his life waiting for the other shoe to drop, and it always did. Tonight his anxieties were singularly focused. Lately he’d been lulled to sleep with the soothing thoughts of _you’ll never break it and all of this is pointless, just accept your fate_. But as he gazed up into Annette’s loft he realized he wasn’t so much worried about if he could break his curse. He still had no clue if he was days or years away from a solution but it was comforting knowing that Annette was chasing down some theory in storybooks.  
  
No, tonight he wasn’t too caught up in the _if_.  
  
He was more worried about the _how._  
  
Felix had no idea how late Annette was up, but there was a flicker of lantern light from the loft as he finally fell asleep. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: Not all who wander are lost, but Felix gets to be both.


	3. Lost

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> With nowhere in particular to go, Felix and Annette start to wander.

Annette was already moving when the first beams of sunlight hit Felix’s face. She seemed to be a bundle of energy, flitting about humming to herself in her little kitchen.   
  
“Good morning” he croaked out, desperate for water.   
  
She didn’t hear him over the racket she was making.   
  
There was a pump outside. He could get cool water out there. Felix struggled as he rushed to pull some semblance of clothing on under the covers. Once he decided he was decent he headed out to the garden.   
  
The sun was just rising and Felix laid down on the ground. The air was cleaner out here. He could wait for Annette to finish whatever she needed to do if he was outdoors. Outdoors was nice, she’d made a nice little garden for herself. There were stunning gardens up north in Derdriu, Annette would probably like those. It wouldn’t be a bad place to travel next.   
  
A few minutes later Annette came out holding two plates, thankfully not commenting on his choice of location, “So I did some reading last night.”   
  
She didn’t seem tired despite the mountain of titles she’d allegedly planned to read. She took a seat in a small wooden chair that Felix hadn’t noticed. She had too much energy. Maybe it was that sickly sweet tea she liked?   
  
“Anything helpful?” he asked, shoveling the eggs into his mouth.   
  
Annette nodded, pulling out her beat up black book from a pocket, “Lots of stories about Wanderers, they’re good narrative fodder you know? They go all over the place, they have lots of adventures and hijinks.”   
  
Felix listened, noting that she seemed excited- a good sign.   
  
Annette dug into her breakfast and reviewed her notes, saying between bites, “So an interesting thread in the stories is that they just end.”   
  
Felix’s stomach soured and he tried to breathe evenly as he asked, “So Wanderers die, the end?”   
  
Annette scoffed, “You really know nothing about curses and stories do you?”   
  
“Enlighten me.”   
  
“So usually what happens is that the Wanderer finds something he wants to stay for, and vows he’ll resist as long as he can. Then years and years pass, the end.” Annette was practically bouncing in her garden, acting as if that was exciting news and not absolutely terrible.   
  
Felix remembered the Wanderers’ stories he’d read as a youth, back before he hated curse stories so much, “It’s always a woman isn’t it? True love breaks the curse or some nonsense?”   
  
Annette swallowed her breakfast, shaking her head gently.   
  
“So that’s what the story would have you believe. But if you actually know about how curses are broken, and luckily for you, I do, you start to notice a pattern. There’s some key elements that every Wanderers story has, you know?”   
  
Felix raised an eyebrow, hoping she’d just get to the point. Could he break his curse or not? Was he going towards something or just… going? He tapped his fork against his plate lightly, trying to focus the energy that was begging him to urge Annette on.   
  
“Have you ever heard the tale of The Wandering Knight? It’s the oldest known legend of a Wanderers curse.”   
  
Of course he knew it. It was one of Ingrid’s favorites to act out when they were all little kids stuck in the palace while their fathers were controlling Faerghus. Back when things were simple and fights and curses were just in stories.   
  
“That’s the one with the giant snake right?”   
  
Sylvain liked to play the snake, rolling around and hissing at all of his words. Right, the snake tried to seduce the hero into certain doom. Sylvain always had too much fun with that.   
  
“A ha, so you have! So what else happens in the story? What sticks out to you?” Annette’s questions were intense, focused, but with an underlying joy that left Felix a little breathless and desperate to come up with the right answer. 

  
Felix didn’t remember every bit of it, just the major set pieces. The wandering knight was always played by Ingrid. He was very upright and formal, always helping people, talking about chivalry and keeping his moral code no matter what circumstances he found himself in.   
  
Felix didn’t think that bit related, that was typical hero stuff. It didn’t seem realistic to Felix’s situation anyway. So instead, he started from the beginning of the story. “He’s cursed by a mage.”

Glenn played the mage because he was five years older and heir and needed to go sit in the meetings while the rest of them played.   
  
“Right, and do you remember anything else about the mage?”   
  
Sometimes Glenn would take a waterskin and spit water like a fountain as part of his contribution to the story. His aim was shockingly good. He could hit you right in the eye if he put his mind to it.   
  
“Something with water?” Felix guessed. Either that or Glenn was just a jerk, which he was, sometimes.   
  
Annette’s approval radiated as she clapped her hands together, excited, “Yes! The mage specifically drew his power from the water- that’s why all the climactic scenes take place by the sea.”   
  
Approval wasn’t usually Felix’s drug of choice but Annette’s was different somehow.   
  
“Yeah, he’s a pirate for a bit. I liked those parts as a kid.”   
  
Dimitri played the pirate captain, a bumbling fool down on his luck. Sometimes he took the role of the actual pirate ship with Ingrid riding on his shoulders. It depended on how bored they were.   
  
Annette lit up “And what’s the big bad monster?”   
  
Felix. The big bad monster was little crybaby Felix who hated hurting anyone and feeling left out. They gave him the biggest monster part, saved him for last so he wouldn’t sit around bored. Also, he liked running head first to tackle Ingrid. It was fun, they’d end by jumping into fountains when it got too hot in the palace courtyards.   
  
“The sea monster. Right. He saves a damsel from the sea monster and then brings her to safety. And uh… She heals him? And he has to recover for a while or something? I don’t actually remember the ending.”   
  
That part wasn’t very interesting to the four of them growing up. Especially Ingrid. They didn’t act out anything once the final monster was slayed.   
  
The way the story ended for Felix was all of them getting yelled at for getting soaking wet and told to go clean up before dinner. 

Annette looked up from her book, “You don’t remember because it just ends. But there’s a pattern in all the stories and it’s the magical element used. The mage’s power source always matches the final monster.”   
  
“Couldn’t that just be a storytelling technique?” Stories liked symmetry.   
  
“Would you believe I’ve read a _lot_ of curse tales? From every culture, country, in any language I can read? No other genre of curse always matches or even _usually_ matches. But I went through every well known Wanderer tale last night including some from Morphis and Dagda and they _all_ match.”   
  
“So what then?” Felix asked, not entirely sure what to do with the information.   
  
“Well remember when you asked if you’d have to fight the moon and I told you to stop being dramatic?”   
  
Felix cringed at his stupidity the day before. Magic was so out of his wheelhouse, he didn’t know what questions were fair.   
  
Annette smiled brightly, “Well as it turns out you don’t need to be so embarrassed because we kind of have to go fight the moon.”   
  


* * *

  
  
The problem, of course, with being cursed by a mage who drew their power from lunar magical energy was that there was no convenient place to hunt down a moon beast.   
  


With nowhere in particular to go Felix decided that he had the most room to travel east, through Leicester. His gut still pushed towards Almyra but that was more about cuisine than a real interest in the country.   
  
It would take weeks to hit the Almyran border on foot. Maybe he’d finally have an idea by then. Maybe if they ran around at night enough they’d find the right kind of monster.   
  
Maybe if he got really lucky the moon would fall out of the sky and he could stab it.   
  
Annette insisted on tagging along and much as Felix resented needing a _compass_ he wasn’t so up his own ass to deny that there were advantages to having Annette along. He also wasn’t so in denial of reality to acknowledge he liked Annette more than he liked most people. She seemed capable, and he was a little excited to see her in action. He’d never fought _alongside_ a mage before.   
  
Shouldn’t the curse be trying to push him away from her if she was effective? 

  
Maybe it liked her because it kept him distracted. Maybe Felix didn’t like her at all- it wasn’t like him to notice someone was pretty beyond the initial introduction. But he just kept noticing it with Annette. In new ways. He liked the travel dress she’d put on, it was much tighter fitting than the more roughspun gown she’d been wearing in her garden. Easier to move in, surely. Easier to see her legs too.   
  
No, that had to be the curse’s influence. He wasn’t Sylvain.   
  
They packed up quickly and headed out right as Felix felt he would burst if he was still one moment longer. There was a mutual restlessness settling between them. Annette seemed uneasy today and it made Felix nervous.   
  


Annette was so self assured and confident back at her home, comfortable, capable. She acted, well not methodically; she at least knew what she was doing, and always seemed to have an answer to his questions or a reassurance that it was fine, she’d seen it all before.   
  
As they started towards Gideon territory something shifted in her. The confidence she’d displayed proudly the day before dwindled as the day went on.   
  
She kept reviewing the information. He’d described Cornelia’s magic at least three times that morning before she agreed that it almost _definitely_ was dark magic.   
  
“I’ve fought dark beasts before.” He said simply, trying to emphasize just how not a problem he thought this solution was. He actually liked the sound of a beast hunt. That felt doable. Challenging. Almost fun. 

  
Wandering, for once, actually didn’t sound that bad.   
  
Annette gave him an odd look, “You’re missing something. We’re definitely missing something. The Wanderer always settles at the end because they actually met the conditions for breaking the curse way earlier in the story. They just don’t realize they can stop. It’s probably not just the beast.”   
  
Well it wouldn’t be that simple would it?   
  
Felix groaned, annoyed, “So we’ll go around doing _heroic_ things and then I’ll try to stop and see if I’m restless. I last about thirty minutes sitting until I’m visibly uncomfortable. These heroes are idiots, they should know if their curses are broken. It’s like they want to be cursed.” 

Annette bit her lip, “The reason to stay might just be a narrative device, but maybe not. I do know that you have to want to break a curse for it to be broken. You need a real reason.”   
  
Felix had half a mind to say that only an idiot wouldn’t want to break their own curse if it was that easy. Sure that meant half the knights in Faerghus were idiots but… also weren’t they? 

“Annette I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.”   
  
She stopped with such force that her stillness had power. Her voice tense as she spelled it out for him, “Look, curses are clever things and they can preserve themselves. It will keep you alive if it can. It will distract you from your breaking conditions. So I need to know your _why_ so I can remind you of it when the time is right or if you decide you’d just rather wander the world than live a life curse free.” 

Felix did not have an answer to that. Why did he not want to be cursed? On the surface level he had responsibilities. Admittedly he never wanted those, they just… happened. Things always seemed to just happen to Felix. A childhood of focus on his personal goals, his friendships, his second-son desires was sidelined for serving a purpose he was never intended to fill.   
  
Resentment at being forced colored his reactions. There could be peace under Dimitri when someone else fought his battles. It should have been a perfect role for Felix but it was soured.   
  
Dukes of Fraldarius were advisors to the king first and foremost. Once Felix saw how deep that loyalty had to run, how much he would need to be willing to sacrifice, it became the last thing he wanted to be good at.   
  
Dimitri was a good king. Felix was a good advisor.   
  
The same placements they’d known they’d have since birth, but everything about it was wrong.   
  
He crossed his arms, shifting from one foot to another, “I hate curses. I don’t want one to control my life.” 

Annette seemed annoyed with him again and Felix realized with a curling nausea he’d failed some test. “That’s not a very good reason. You need something stronger than spite, Felix.” 

Spite was all he seemed capable of at the moment. “I’ll let you know when I think of one.”   
  
What drew him back to a life he never wanted? Not much.   
  
They walked for the next hour in tense silence before Annette broke it with the softest, simplest question.   
  
“Felix what’s your favorite color?” 

He coughed, trying to find his voice. That absolutely could not be curse related, could it? 

“Uh. Blue, I guess? What’s yours?”   
  
“Mine’s yellow. But a specific one, you know. Not old parchment yellow…” 

* * *

  
  


At midday Annette insisted they stop to rest and eat. Felix hadn’t even realized so much time had passed. She had been mostly quiet that morning, and Felix’s mind kept forgetting she was there until she tripped, or stepped too loudly on a branch, or asked an idle question about his favorite type of tea to fill empty space.   
  
“Are you okay?” Felix asked, taking a bite out of some rations.   
  
Annette frowned for a split second and seemed to catch her self. Her shallow smile didn’t even bring out her dimple, “I’m fine. Why? Is something wrong with you?” 

Felix was not the shrewdest man, he wasn’t great at the games people played at court, but he’d always had a knack for sensing if something was off.

“You seem nervous.”   
  
Annette sighed and ran her fingers through her hair. “I’m fine Felix. Thank you for your concern.”   
  
She looked up into the sky and Felix tried to follow her gaze.   
  
There was a midday moon out as if to taunt them. Annette spoke again, “I don’t like not knowing things. I like solving problems, I’m usually good at that.”   
  
Felix shrugged, “I get that.”   
  
He wasn’t sure if he was supposed to help her or just leave it, so he let the matter drop. Silence didn’t bother him. Silence reminded him of libraries and home and school, which weren’t his best places to be honest. But there was active silence too, the kind he found in solitude. By the water or in the mountains. The silence of hunting or thinking or just needing ten minutes to himself where no one was asking him the complicated questions where he knew the information but whatever he said was somehow unsatisfactory in a way he didn’t get. 

Outright wrong, sometimes, or correct and delivered in some way that was too honest.   
  
Silence was Sylvain coming up with an excuse before pulling him out of some awful political meeting and just giving him space to cool down before giving him some other reason to be angry- another dumped girlfriend, an idiotic comment, something uniquely terrible his parents said or did.   
  
A crack in the distance distracted him from his thoughts.   
  
“Did you hear that?” Annette whispered, turning in the direction.   
  
Felix pressed his finger to his lips, “Stay put. I’ll go see what it is.”   
  
  
He grasped his swords and started stepping lightly deeper into the woods. If she protested he didn’t hear her. Thoughts and possibilities swirled, the situation needed to be handled quickly. It was one of three things. Either a harmless animal, but one large enough to make a ruckus or a dangerous one, which they needed to know about to stay safe.   
  
Or humans. Humans would be the worst. No one was out in these woods that far off the road on a leisurely walk. 

Felix heard another crack and pressed himself against a tree, listening for cues as to what it might be. At the very least he hoped it wasn’t a wolf or some other beast, those were much easier to take out in a group. 

Inwardly he kind of hoped it was. Annette woke up so early that he wasn’t able to run any sword drills, he would be rusty if he neglected training any longer.   
  
He held his breath, and tried his best to focus. And then he heard it. _Voices_. 

“I definitely heard something Boss.” A low male voice.  
  
“The accents were high class. I think we’ve hit the jackpot.” Another, a smidge higher with a certain nasal quality.   
  
Felix mouthed an obscenity. Bandits. His heart sped up and he peeked out, staying as quiet as possible.   
  
Three of them, brandishing big axes. Moving slowly but not necessarily quietly. All were far too big to effectively stealth through the woods.   
  
Felix was smarter than that, faster, better trained. He timed his steps with theirs, sneaking around the back. Three men. Too many to handle at once. They’d fight dirty. He could feel a cold chill run through him as he chanced his odds. Running would be wiser. He didn’t have a bow, damn it.   
  
He wanted to fight. He wanted so badly to ignore his superior training and knowledge and just do as his body willed. But it wasn’t just him. 

He wasn’t sure what Annette could handle. If he made noise at least he could give her warning. Felix unsheathed his sword and snuck up behind the best dressed one. The boss, presumably. 

  
“My accent?” Felix said, pressing his blade into the bandit’s back.   
  
The other two jumped, turning towards him as the leader froze.   
  
“Little noble prick playing hero?” The leader laughed, but as he tried to tuck away from Felix his instincts kicked in. 

  
Felix swung for his middle, elbowing him with his off arm for good measure. The bandit hit the ground, and his axe went flying off into the woods.   
  
Felix laughed, amused. Amateurs. His odds were better than he thought. “Something like that. Come on, I’m waiting.”   
  
The two men rushed him, swinging their axes high.   
  
Clearly they were not used to fighting in such close proximity, Felix noted. They didn’t keep track of each other. Felix swung at the first, the bigger man, dodging out of the way of the second. He parried the axe with a grunt, feeling his muscles strain as he gauged their strength. 

The bigger grunt huffed, swinging again. Felix side stepped, slicing at the bandit, deflecting the axe swing. This was the kind of fight Felix was best at- slow enemies, poorly trained, unaware. Easy, though he couldn’t be sloppy. They had numbers. They had raw power.   
  
If he got hit, they’d have the upper hand in moments.   
  
The next attack missed him entirely and the smaller bandit grunted with frustration as his axe hit dirt. Perfect. Felix spun, trying his best to get into just the right place so that as the other attacked…   
  


The bigger bandit yelled out a war cry, swinging wildly- a brutal technique that favored strength over accuracy. Felix smiled, idiot. He ducked to the ground, rolling quickly as the larger bandit’s back swing hit the second ruffian with the butt of his axe.   
  
“Oh, shit.” The bigger one said, as the smaller fell to the ground with a sickening thud.   
  
“How useful. Thank you.” Felix taunted, brandishing his sword.   
  
Not a challenge at all. Pity. There was always a rightness that came from fighting, it was the thing in the world Felix truly excelled at. It was what he was meant to do.   
  
He’d end this quickly. Find better opponents. He looked wealthy- these wouldn’t be the last bandits to try and take advantage.   
  
Hopefully the next batch would be more suited to his skills.   
  
The bigger bandit was even sloppier, hopped up on anger and guilt. His attacks left huge openings as he swung, and Felix was able to take him down with a few precise strikes.   
  
Now where was the third? Felix turned, trying to find him. Two down, one to go. The boss, maybe he’d be worth Felix’s time.   
  
He heard rapid footsteps deeper in the forest and ran towards them, hopping over felled logs, failing to find any trail markings. How daring, running when it was clear he was outclassed.   
  
A few minutes into the chase Felix stopped, confident he’d won. Shame, he would have liked to get the third one. Still. No need to chase someone who wasn’t looking to fight any longer. What was the fun in that?   
  
He wiped his sword down, but didn’t sheathe it quite yet. He needed to be aware, this could be an ambush.   
  
As he searched for the third bandit’s trail he was fairly certain he was alone. He looked up into the trees, peering at the sun- still mid day. He hadn’t been gone long, a half hour at most. 

  
Felix turned back trying to retrace his steps. There would be bodies, signs of a struggle. Stupid as his curse made him, it didn’t make him blind. The main road of Matteus was wide and well traveled, a trade route. It would be easy to find.   
  
He walked a few minutes and despite his carelessness while rushing, despite how easy it was to track a man who was _running_ , realized with a white hot fury he lost the trail.   
  
Were trail markers a type of map? Was he suddenly completely incapable of doing anything more than walking aimlessly?   
  
His stomach twisted apprehensively and he mumbled to himself “I’m not going back anywhere. I haven’t been here before.”   
  
He tried to find his own steps, look for the blood. Listen for the bandits. Any of the dozen of ways he’d learned to navigate in a forest since he was young. 

Nothing.   
  
He spoke louder to himself or his stupid curse, “I’m going _to_ the road and so help me if you turn me around I will break you. I will break you with relish. I will spend every waking moment trying to break you and I will parade around Faerghus telling everyone how _insignificant_ a Wanderers curse is. So easy most break it accidentally.”   
  
He could picture Sylvain out in town somewhere, a terrible bar he loved in Gautier. He felt a pull on his senses. Maybe the curse was scared of him now. Good. It should be. “Sylvain is going to steal my story, use it to impress women, use it as an excuse to run out on them. You’re going to be boiled down to an insatiable idiot’s favorite new technique. Pathetic.”   
  
Something in the back of his mind told him he was heading towards _something_ but it didn’t seem quite right. No. Wrong friend. He felt himself get nervous again, totally unable to find his way, and so he started threatening his own stupid curse becuase it felt like the only thing to do.   
  
Ingrid was straightforward. Better threat. Scarier, generally. “You’re going to be so boring even Ingrid won’t care about you. And she _loves_ your type. But no. You chose the wrong man to try to control. I’m not going to have any stupid adventures just to spite you. I’m going to travel in the world’s most boring way, just solve my problem efficiently and easily using boring messy tactics. If Ingrid has no interest in you, you’ll die pathetically. That will be the end of Wandering forever, mages will stop casting it because it’s such a _boring_ and _ineffective_ curse.”   
  
Ingrid was probably reading at home, in that window seat she liked so much even though it faced the wind and was always too drafty. Another pull, though this one felt weird. Off. Too cold somehow? Annette was warm. 

  
Annette should scare the curse. If it wasn’t scared of him it should be scared of the real threat.   
  
“Annette is going to break you. She’s going to find the solution and not let you trick me and I _will_ let her write papers about me. Me? You want to trick me? I’ve wanted to run away my whole life, you’re a joke. Annette is the one you should be scared of. I’m going to find her and we’re going to fix this. So stop _distracting me_.” 

Emotions heightened he picked a direction and walked with the unfounded confidence of bandits trying to jump a noble of Faerghus. Annette felt like she was in that direction. Gideon. Annette was going to Gideon, so Felix would too. She could trick the curse, she’d find him. He marched, loudly enough to scare off any animals or bandits. Stupid. This whole thing was stupid. She’d need to put a bell on him like a rebellious house cat at this rate.   
  
She’d find that funny. He’d need to tell her that. It would break her out of whatever mood she was in this morning. 

* * *

Walking still felt better than sitting but Felix’s senses were completely on edge. His spine crawled, something was approaching him. He couldn’t hear it but, shit, the third bandit maybe? 

Something touched his shoulder and Felix jumped as adrenaline long settled poured back through him. He went for his sword before he heard a familiar voice,  
  
“Where did you go?” Annette’s presence was a genuine relief and Felix almost collapsed on the ground. He was dignified enough to find a rock as if that made it better.   
  
“I got… turned around. There were bandits, I got two of them, but the third ran.”   
  
Annette didn’t seem amused, “And you didn’t think to call for help?” 

Feeling suddenly worried of the consequences of pissing her off, Felix tried to phrase his next thought gently, “I didn’t know if you could help.”   
  
Annette snorted and suddenly her hands were tracing in the air, Felix tried to scramble back as the familiar glow of magic began to form. Her eyes met his and she smiled mischievously. Even with the second of warning a gust blew him ten feet back, straight into a tree. 

Felix coughed, the air pushed out of him, vision white. When his sight came back to him Annette was looking a little too pleased with herself. Goddess she looked good like that, confident and a little angry.   
  


Twice. She’d bested him twice. 

  
He acquiesced, “Fine. Apparently you can help. Noted.”   
  
She had the grace to walk over and help him up. He was fine, just a little bruised. And impressed.   
  


With her hand still wrapped around his wrist she laughed, “And you can say lost Felix. Turned around, really?” 

He suppressed an amused smile, enjoying her teasing, “I’m a problem. Sorry.”   
  
She smiled and Felix felt his stomach flip as she said, “Like I said, I like to solve problems.” 

* * *

As they headed into the afternoon moods were lighter, and Felix, had he been a different kind of man, would have admitted that he was having fun.   
  
Annette seemed completely incapable of silence like this, filling every moment with a question or the summary of another Wanderer story or ten theories about his curse. She didn’t sing and Felix felt too embarrassed to ask outright- though he didn’t get to see her get all flustered about it the day before.   
  


Annette asked him about his favorite stories as they continued down the road.   
  
“I don’t think I’m as well read as you. What’s yours?” He said, hoping she’d tell him anything about herself.   
  
Annette asked a lot of questions but she wasn’t answering very many.   
  
She shrugged, “Would you believe I like really mushy romantic stuff? Love at first sight stories, things like that? I read a lot of curse tales and adventure stories for research so sometimes I just like, you know, silly things.”   
  
“I suppose everyone needs hobbies.” Felix replied, not sure what to make of that. Annette seemed so matter of fact about things. Romance? 

“So what are yours? You knew some tales, you seem capable. Adventure stories? Heroic tales?” Annette guessed.   
  
Felix scoffed, “No. I hate anything where the hero’s obstacles are mostly self imposed.”   
  
Annette seemed surprised, her hands tracing her thought patterns as she said, “You knew the Wanderers tale so well though.”   
  
Felix shrugged, “My brother loves them. My sister in law too. I hear a lot of it.”   
  
Annette kept walking but looked away from him as she asked, “Oh. Do you have a lot of family?”   
  
He’d told her his last name the night before. Maybe she’d forgotten? Maybe she wasn’t from Faerghus. Her accent was certainly northern enough, and she’d studied with Mercedes at the school of sorcery. Maybe she didn’t know who he was? Not everyone was well versed in the noble houses of Faerghus.   
  
Lucky them.   
  
He answered her, not sure exactly how to explain it to someone who didn’t instantly know what Fraldarius meant. “Not really. Some cousins. An uncle and aunt. My brother and his wife. She was a friend of mine growing up, we’re… close I guess?” As close as Felix was to anyone.   
  
Annette listened intently, “Parents? You wrote your father a letter.” She asked.   
  
Felix sighed, and Annette seemed almost instantly to understand, matching his sour face.   
  
“My mother died when I was a kid. I have a father, he’s… It’s complicated. We don’t get along.” An understatement.   
  
“You mentioned.” She said with a weight that left Felix feeling weirdly understood.   
  
“Do uh, you have any family Annette?” He asked, realizing he hardly knew anything about her outside of her work. This was the first time she asked anything other than bland preferences. 

  
“My mom. She lives with my uncle in Dominic.” 

  
Her statement felt final, end of the list.   
  
“You’re from Dominic then?” He asked. That was near the coast, her location made some sense with that.   
  
Annette shook her head, and her face screwed up before she answered in one curt word, “Fhirdiad.” Was it him or was she being oddly cagey about that?   
  
“Oh, whereabouts?” He asked, trying to make conversation. Trying to learn about her without asking the thing he was dying to ask. 

_How did a mage from the Kingdom get into the business of curses?_   
  
She blushed, “Oh um… The inner district. Do you know the old lion statue? The big brass one?”   
  
He did. It was an imposing mass that caught the sun and blinded anyone who got too close, burnt anyone who dared touch it in the summer. It was right by the palace. Though that particular square was best known for housing the families of knights.   
  
“I’m familiar.” He mumbled.   
  
She wasn’t saying anything about it, and silence from Annette felt uncomfortable. Felix added quickly, “My brother lived there for a time.” Would she make the connection? Was that vague enough, polite enough not to outright ask because something about the conversation felt like walking onto a pond in the middle of winter. Shaky. Probably safe. But dangerous inherently. Still, Annette made talking a little too easy.   
  
Her eyes widened just a bit as she caught his meaning, “So your brother is…”   
  
“Was.” He cut her off. Wait, that sounded wrong, “He’s alive, just not… That. Anymore.” Goddess he did not want to talk about this. Why would he bring this up? Just to feel more connected to her? Stupid. Annette did not need to know everything about him.   
  
He was embarrassed at overstepping, feeling the warm heat start in his ears. A warning sign, he’d be red in seconds.   
  
He sped up, knowing he could outpace her without losing her entirely. The conversation was over. It was abundantly clear to him that neither of them was willing to say what they meant.   
  
For some reason, not that he could place it, Annette didn’t like talking about Knights either.   
  
Annette broke into a run, yelling at him to stop. It was funny, watching her flustered sprint. She turned hilariously red when she was angry, though he could clearly see the dimple on her cheek as she ran.   
  
He slowed a little, she probably needed the win. With his accommodation she caught up, panting out, “Going to have to put a bell on you like a cat at this rate.”   
  
Felix hid his smile behind his hand. 

* * *

The shadows grew longer and the sky turned a brilliant orange, yet Annette made no moves to stop. Felix kept walking without complaint. Torchlight lit by fire spell always lasted longer, and the moon was relatively bright. It was uncanny how easy it was to just keep moving. His body relished it.   
  
The conversation about books got Felix’s mind on opera, and Mittlefrank in particular. He liked the productions written by their composers best, but he’d never traveled to see it.   
  
Could his body handle a whole opera? Could a story hold his attention well enough? What if he went straight there, sat down, and just took it in? Three hours. He could sit for three hours. 

  
They walked into the night, and Felix finally felt his stomach start to gurgle. “Hey, can we take a break for dinner? Even if we’re hunting moon beasts we shouldn’t starve ourselves.”   
  
Annette jumped and waved her hands, flustered. “Oh no! Sorry I just got so distracted. My brain was just… Sorry. Sorry Felix. Yes. Dinner. Rest, right?”   
  
Maybe not hunting beasts tonight? The full moon would arrive in a week or so, and their chances of locating one would be higher. The first day of travel was a joy, a week of this might be the most fun Felix had in years.   
  
He’d forgotten how great life was without a desk and paperwork.   
  
They found a break in the woods just a bit off the road that looked flat and secluded enough for camp, and Felix began to unpack his little tent.   
  
“You can make a fire right?” He asked, focused on tying knots. It was a single tent, really meant for one. Though maybe they’d need to take watches? Annette hadn’t packed a tent and her bedroll looked brand new, hardly used. She must be used to staying in inns, though thankfully there was no complaint from her about roughing it.   
  
“Yes obviously.” She huffed out, beginning to gather up sticks.   
  
Felix knew better than to wander off hunting at this point. They had rations. They’d stop in a town soon, it would be fine.   
  
In no time at all they had a little campsite set up. Felix grabbed a few sticks and began to whittle down a thicker one in an attempt to keep his hands busy as Annette turned pages in her notes, tracing lines on the ground.   
  
“What are you doing?” He asked.   
  
She shrugged, “Alarm spell. You need to sleep right?”   
  
Felix raised an eyebrow, “Wander is more of a state of being, but I’m still human. Of course I need sleep.”   
  
She laughed softly, “So this way no watches needed. I get a little distracted sometimes. It’s… one of my professors taught me back at school.”   
  
Alarm spell sounded useful. Felix slept like the dead nowadays, probably exhausted from the stupid curse. He was lucky no one had tried to attack him at night yet.   
  
Annette brought a little camp set and began boiling something over the fire. “I made use of the time when you were _turned around_ this afternoon.”   
  
He missed having something to do, though he was useless at cooking. Turns around the camp felt pointless, though enticing. No, he’d be useful. Equipment. Arrows were fiddly work, it would keep his hands busy at least.   
  
He whittled some sticks into a straight line. Though he’d practiced from the time he was young he wasn’t artistic enough for anything more complicated than arrow maintenance. Solid, steady work helped him breathe easier, though his leg would jostle irritatingly. Annette would stare at his hands every few minutes.   
  
“Do you mind?” He asked. Annette looked at him like a person most of the time but now there was something intense in her looks.   
  
“Mind what?” She jumped at his question.   
  
“You’re staring.”   
  
She looked a little embarrassed, shoulders hunching as she stammered, “Sorry I just… Didn’t realize what you were doing.”   
  
Felix tried to calm his nerves, feeling his jaw click as he decided he’d drop it. “It’s fine. Arrows. I assume your weapon doesn’t require maintenance like that?”   
  
A little smile, “Study. Nothing so… physical.”   
  
“Right. Mercedes said you did the school of sorcery together.”   
  
At the mention of her friend Annette seemed to brighten, “Mercie was my best friend there. We’re still best friends, you know, just… apart now.”   
  
“Did you study white magic?”   
  
This took her by surprise. “Oh. No. Actually I’m pretty… not bad. I’m okay at it. Not great. Reason makes sense to me, Faith is just… I don’t like it as much. Mercie is great at both. She’s amazing.”   
  
Interesting. Garreg Mach was the same, he guessed. Different disciplines under the same roof. Faith magic and reason were objectively different, though it all felt the same to Felix.   
  
He tried to sound casual as he asked, “So is Cursebreaking more reason then?”   
  
Annette dropped the spoon straight into the pot. “Oh no! Oh shoot. Darn.”   
  
Regret flooded him, his question shocked her. Too personal. And it seemed like they were two seconds away from Annette burning her hand or having wood flavored dinner. Felix walked over, frowning at the still slowly simmering dish. He took the stick he was using and stabbed into the pot, trying to hook the end of the spoon.   
  
Well, it was easier than hitting a rabbit.   
  
“Here,” He said, handing her the now dirty spoon.   
  
Annette stared at it, then Felix. She still looked half shocked by his question, and something about how she held her mouth reminded Felix of trying to phrase things diplomatically.   
  
“No. Cursebreaking is something entirely different.” She answered quietly.   
  
She didn’t necessarily seem upset with him, not yelling or recoiling. It was a rude question to ask, though Annette seemed perfectly happy to talk about curses. He’d chance it once more.   
  
“How’d you learn then?” Felix asked, trying to match her quiet tone.   
  
She turned red, “You can’t just ask someone that Felix! That’s! You’re very rude, you know. No manners at all.” 

Realizing that he was upsetting her more than he meant to he retreated away from the fire. Okay. Taboo. His life had to be an open book, but no, Annette could have some privacy. The right of the cursebreaker verses the right of the cursed or some nonsense.   
  
He wouldn’t press again.   
  
Silence fell over the camp, punctuated with the steady rhythm of carving and occasionally a little hum of something from Annette.   
  
When Felix next looked up Annette handed him a small, rough carved wooden bowl without a word. They sat far too close on a cleared patch that was really only big enough for one.   
  
Awkwardness settled over the two of them as he sipped from the bowl directly. It was mostly wild vegetable, some mushrooms. It could have done with some meat. He’d try to catch something tomorrow.   
  
She spoke first, quietly, voice heavy, “My father’s cursed.”   
  
Cursed. Present tense.   
  
“Do you know where he is?” Felix asked, half suspecting the answer. He wasn’t sure what he did to earn that piece of information, he’d upset her so much before. 

  
“No. He’s… Like you. I think. I’ve tried to track him a few times but he always disappears, never repeats.” 

Right. Her _academic_ interest suddenly made all the sense in the world.   
  
“That sounds hard.” He said simply.   
  
“The more I learn about curses the less I understand him. It’s not even for me, you know, it’s for my mom. He left without a word, and she misses him. I want to break his curse so he can come home, but I need to know why he never _ever_ wrote me. Or her. Never tried to visit. His actions don’t make sense.”   
  
Her father was a knight of Faerghus, he’d worked out that much. Knights took their curses as a battle scar, as a mark of their service to the crown. If he was cursed to wandering he would just wander. Act like that was righteous.   
  
What kind of man would wander without writing home? Letting them know he was alive?   
  
He tried to have empathy, he understood a bit about father’s who let curses ruin everything, “You must really hate him.” 

  
Annette reacted as if he’d burned her.   
  
“Hate him?” Her voice was pinched, and she wrapped her arms around herself.   
  
“He left you.” Felix tried to explain, backpedal. He always said the wrong thing but… wouldn’t she? He would.   
  
Annette shook her head slowly, and tried to catch his eye, “Why would I hate him, it’s not his fault. I just want to know why he left without saying anything. Why he never sent a messenger or went anywhere in Faerghus. Wrote.” 

He still didn’t get it. “He’s cursed. You know why.”   
  
Annette came closer to him, thighs touching- she was so warm, “No I mean… Look. It’s not like I blame someone for not breaking their own curse, it’s hard. I don’t hate him. He’s my father. I love him, still. I’m angry, of course I am. But I can hate what someone did and still love him and want to save him, you know?”   
  


He didn’t.   
  
“But he hurt you.” Felix said weakly. 

  
“So?”   
  
And there was the difference. Felix liked to take care of problems by eliminating them. Annette liked to fix things. Similar. Not the same.   
  
Differences always chafed. They buried under his skin until he simply could not bear them any longer. It made it hard to make friends- someone who deep down didn’t believe in the same things he did always disappointed him in the end.   
  
He didn’t want that for Annette. Didn’t want to be disappointed by her. Caring was not weakness, though it flew dangerously close at times. Left one vulnerable.   
  
All Felix could think to say was, “Don’t let people use curses as their excuses for everything.” 

* * *

Felix was yawning shortly after dinner and looked back at his tent. No reason to delay that conversation, it couldn’t be any worse than anything else they’d talked about that day. “It’s a tight squeeze but we’ll both fit. It’s… If you have an issue I can sleep outside.”   
  
Annette looked confused for a moment, and then looked over to the tent. “Right, ha, I’d forgotten about that.”   
  
She was too relaxed about sharing a tent. That was not what Felix was expecting. There were rules about this sort of thing, expectations. It was indecent enough that Felix felt gross for even suggesting it, even though it was practical.   
  
Weird. He never felt weird about sharing a tent with Ingrid. But that was different. Right?   
  
She kept her book in her lap, flipping through the pages idly, “It’s fine Felix. You look tired. I’ll join you later. I just… I need to think. I want to read more.” 

Felix kicked the dirt, hating himself for what he said next. Annette broke curses, she knew plenty. She was using him, a little, to learn about Wandering. Felix didn’t mind being used. He was a tool, always had been. He was openly using her knowledge, and the more she knew, the faster they’d break the curse together.   
  
This would not help break the curse. He wanted to tell her anyway.   
  
“I um… I noticed something today.”   
  
She looked up at him expectantly.   
  
“When I was in the woods I was thinking about my friends. And I knew exactly where they were. Not just where they lived, I knew _exactly_ where they were. And when I started thinking about you… Well I changed direction. And you found me right after. It doesn’t make any sense but I think I know how to find things.”   
  
Annette looked at him, curious, “ I was looking for you. We found each other.”   
  
Felix clenched his fists, trying to explain how his stupid cursed mind worked.   
  
“I found your house right away.”   
  
Annette didn’t seem very impressed, “I mean I’m not so far off the path.”   
  
Felix paced, letting the words tumble out of his mouth, “No it’s… It was too easy. I came through your garden. Through the woods. Not off the path.”   
  
Annette let out a soft breath, and there was a tinge of excitement as her questions turned analytic again, “Any other evidence? Has this happened to you before?”   
  
Felix tried to retrace his steps mentally. He’d mostly gone familiar places when he was first cursed, and while he couldn’t place how he got anywhere he remembered something weird. Something he hadn’t noticed when it happened.   
  
“Yes. When I was at the school of sorcery I found the library without any help. I didn’t make a single wrong turn. Mercedes was behind me the whole time, ten paces behind me. She yelled at me for running.”   
  
“She does hate to run. Wow. So. Let’s experiment, okay Felix. Where’s your father right now?”   
  
Felix frowned, not feeling the familiar pull from that afternoon. Home probably. He wasn’t sure. “I can’t tell. I think maybe… I can’t picture home too well. I haven’t seen my friends.”   
  
She sighed, “That makes sense, backtracking is an issue. How about… Okay something silly. Where’s the king of Faerghus?”   
  
Felix rested his head in his palms, Dimitri was in Fhirdiad, but his thoughts didn’t have the crystal clear picture that Ingrid or Sylvain brought to mind, “Can’t tell you that either.”   
  
Annette plopped on the ground, “Great. So then it’s not really anything.”   
  
Felix tried so hard not to be condescending as he explained, “No Annette. I can’t tell you where the King of Faerghus is because I saw him a week ago.” 

She jumped, “Oh. So you’re…”   
  
“A Fraldarius.” He answered. He’d told her already.   
  
She started drawing something in the dirt, “Important, was what I was going to say.”   
  
He shrugged. She wasn’t wrong.   
  
Annette tried again, “The Emperor of Adrestia. Where is she?”   
  
Felix thought of her. Shockingly small. Bright hair. A little cold in the way royalty was supposed to be in mixed company. Dimitri couldn’t do that, he was practically twice her size but she was twice as scary.

He pictured her for a moment and his gut _knew_ . Knew as sure as he was sitting next to Annette.   
  
“She’s in a garden in Enbarr. South and a little east. Try someone I haven’t met.” 

Annette looked almost hopeful as she whispered, “Where’s my father?”   
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: There's multiple objectives, but still only one tent.


	4. Intention

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Conditions are met in some ways but not others.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2021! We made it! 
> 
> This chapter is brought to you by the Octopath Traveler soundtrack. It obviously slaps, we know it slaps, but uh, if you haven’t picked it up in a year (like yours truly) recall that it is AMAZING and it’s all I’ve listened to for the past two weeks.

Platitudes meant very little to Felix. Always had.    
  
Difficulty expressing himself was a lifelong struggle. Too easily overwhelmed. As a youth things would bubble over into tears and snot and a clinginess that his friends humored even as he was sure it annoyed them.  _ He doesn’t mean to do it, he’s just _ ,  _ well Felix is who he is, we have to love him for it _ Glenn would explain when Sylvain rolled his eyes at his little shadow or Dimitri felt guilty about leaving Felix behind when princely duties called.    
  
It made Felix feel worse as a child, knowing that everyone humored him and thought he was soft. In some ways it was a feedback loop- he worried everyone was going to leave him behind, didn’t truly like him, was lying to him so he clung even harder. 

Nobody else got it. Sylvain was named heir at five years old, just enough time to show he was not as deranged as his much older brother. Glenn and Dimitri were first born. Ingrid and Glenn betrothed. They all had futures tied neatly together. 

Even as he learned boundaries and a little self control the need for reassurance remained. His friends loved him- action showed that, filled the little part of him that always feared being left behind. No. The five of them were loyal to each other- just as their fathers were. There would be a place for Felix in their lives. They promised they’d all stick together. Northern Faerghus would always protect its own.    
  
Then curses were cast, and Felix learned that the famed loyalty of northern Faerghus only extended so far.    
  
Felix took Glenn’s place, became cold, shut his feelings away even as they burned far too hot. Felix did not stop feeling. He just stopped expecting anyone to care.    
  
His father showed him with one suggestion that intentions were meaningless. Action was the only way to prove anything. 

Intent to find Annette’s father, and ability to do so were two very different things. So when Felix tried to reach out to his curse to find Annette’s father and felt nothing at all he panicked.   
  
Nothing about his stupid curse could work the way he wanted it to, could it?   
  
“Can you tell me more about him? I don’t know if  _ Annette’s father _ is specific enough.” He would not lie to her, but a sinking suspicion came to him in the nothingness. No. He just needed more information. He wouldn’t go to the worst conclusion yet.    
  
Annette bit her lip, tracing something into the dirt. She was solemn, shy about this for some reason Felix couldn’t place.    
  
“Oh. If you think a name would help, it’s Gustave Dominic.”    
  
Familiarity sparked in the back of his mind. Right, he was Dimitri’s combat instructor. He’d never met the man himself, but he’d heard of him certainly. 

  
Felix felt something right out of grasp and he frowned, trying to rack his mind for vague memories. 

  
Not willing to give up quite yet he asked, “What else about him?”    
  
Annette swallowed, “He was strict, but encouraging. Always really held me to high standards, held himself to even higher ones. Um… He kind of looked like me, but much taller. Red hair. He’d be in his early sixties by now. What else? He was religious. Loyal. Really proud of his work.”    
  
Felix felt the tiniest tug in his gut and the beginnings of sensations. Cold. The smell of recently cut wood. Metal polish. The relief that flooded him was palpable. “He’s alive”    
  
Annette stared at him oddly for a moment, he could see from her posture she was trying to stay calm, “Well of course he’s alive. You know where he is?” The hope in her eyes was crushing. 

  
Felix shook his head, “Not as clearly as my friends. But there’s… I think we’d just need to keep moving. But I promise, if my curse can find him, we’ll find him.” 

Annette gasped, words tumbling out of her mouth, “No. Felix you can’t promise me that. What if we find the beast before we find my father? Without your curse...”    
  
Felix spoke before he thought, “I have to want to break it, right? This will be my payment to you. I’ll wait until I fill my promise.” 

Annette leaped, wrapping her arms around him in a tight hug that was startling but not at all unpleasant.    
  
“Thank you. Thank you so much. You can’t… You don’t know what that means to me.” Annette clung and Felix tried his best to let her have her moment. He tried to stroke her back, unsure how to respond.    
  
He shouldn’t have promised that. It could take months to find a man who didn’t want to be found. Felix needed his curse taken care of, he had a whole territory on his shoulders, a king who fretted too much about every tiny detail. A lifelong grudge against curses- and suddenly he’s offered to roll over and let it take him for a convenient side effect.    
  
Even as his mind gave him a dozen reasons why he was an idiot he didn’t regret his promise to Annette. 

She felt more important. 

* * *

Sleep did nothing to solidify Gustave’s location. East still felt right, though his mind no longer reminded him of the many appeals of Almyra so much as more local attractions.    
  
“You sleep like the dead you know,” Annette commented cheerfully as he started packing up the tent.    
  
Right. They’d slept side by side the night before- not that Felix noticed or had the opportunity to appreciate it. Annette stayed up later than him researching. Probably for the best, he’d be too anxious to sleep knowing she was  _ right there _ .    
  
Felix shrugged, “I’m asleep, wouldn’t know.” Any anxiety he’d avoided the night before came rushing back twice as strong- along with the guilt of reading into it. It was necessary, for safety’s sake. He needed to get over himself. It was just sleeping, it wasn’t like they’d done anything more than breathe the same air.    
  
She hummed cheerfully behind him, “You don’t snore, for what it’s worth.”    
  
Annette had, seemingly, woken up early enough to break most of camp, burn breakfast, make a second breakfast, and review a bit of what she knew about lunar magic. Felix marveled at her energy, she was mumbling her research to herself and flipping through notes she’d written by firelight. He stared for just long enough that she noticed.    
  
“Oh, you okay?” She raised an eyebrow pleasantly.    
  
Felix snorted, “I can’t stay still and you seem to get twice as much done as I do.”    
  
Annette, for some reason, turned bright red. She stammered out “Oh um… I just… um… I work hard. Always have. Why is there something weird about that?”    
  
Felix tried to reassure her, feeling stupid for saying anything at all, “No. It’s impressive. It’s rich coming from me considering, but rest is important you know.”    
  
Annette’s gaze sharpened and she almost seemed to laugh to herself, some joke Felix didn’t get. “I’ll rest when this is over.” 

* * *

Eight fruitless days passed as they traveled further on towards nothing and everything. The full moon crept ever closer and Felix’s hair stood on edge as the sun set each night. Beasts, fathers, solutions, something was coming. The curse was uneasy at whatever it led them to- Each time they started off for the day ten enticing options cast through his mind- master blacksmiths, obscure fighting schools he read about in books, old friends from his school days who led much more interesting lives. Felix’s jaw clenched as he focused each morning, reminding himself that he was not wandering selfishly. They stayed on the road eastward and the feeling of rightness only increased.    
  
Annette was a welcome distraction from his distraction, a bundle of completely different nerves. It reminded him of choir practice back at school- Felix knew in theory that notes would sound next to each other and ring out stronger from their contrast. He just couldn't ever find the right ones in his own voice.    
  
With Annette everything sang. There was a routine, a rightness. When he was nervous, she was full of explanations, competence. When she second guessed or over thought he could find simplicity.    
  
They’d known each other a week, but he felt more in sync with her than people he’d known and worked with for years. They settled into a perfect rhythm and Felix almost felt content with his curse. What would another moon or two be if he could travel side by side?    
  
The freedom was euphoric.    
  
There were still things they kept from each other- Family, much as their goals revolved around it, remained a taboo topic after that first day. Annette didn’t ask much about his role- she knew he was involved in the politics of Faerghus, but their conversations were more  _ personal _ than that. She didn’t ask about Felix Fraldarius, advisor to the king, heir to a Dukedom. 

She asked about Felix, the unfortunately cursed wanderer who liked spicy foods and music. Who liked swordplay with a single minded focus. It was at once as easy and familiar as air, but still useful, challenging, always more difficult.    
  
Annette felt the same about magic- spells were problems with clear solutions though the instructions got more dense and less helpful as the difficulty increased. Curses were even more obtuse.    
  
“I always liked it though, magic. There were people back at school who would look at a theorem and just be able to cast- it isn’t like that for me. Everything I know came from blood, sweat, tears, and tea.” 

Felix wanted to tell her how much he understood that, how similar they were in that way. But that went back to a lifetime of being compared to Glenn and there was something kind of nice about how little Annette knew about him, his brother, his family. Instead he asked “Not coffee?” The drink of choice of the few mages who found their way to Garreg Mach.    
  
Annette blanched, sticking her tongue out in disgust. “Ugh, I  _ hate _ coffee Felix. Why have something bitter when you can have something sweet?” 

Annette told him about Mercedes, who was the first friend she made after her father left. The only one who looked at her as her own person- not the  _ daughter of that vanished knight _ , _ poor thing _ . She had friends from southern Faerghus, Ashe was the source of many of her storybooks.    
  
Her stories were interesting even when describing the most mundane memories. Looking for a lost doll turned into a tale of daring rescue from ghosts, the power of friendship, and the scars parents leave.    
  
Felix could listen to her speak for days. 

Felix was still easily distracted on the road, but Annette stuck to his side like glue so it didn’t feel like a problem. Speaking to her kept his mind just unfocused enough that forks in the road were nothing, Felix always knew exactly how to turn.    
  
They both found that encouraging, though neither of them were willing to admit it. Still, any time Felix guided them Annette would give him a little smile, and they’d keep going together.    
  
On their ninth day of travel Felix started having the strangest craving yet.    
  
Sweet buns. A food that he, notably, hated. Still his mind thought about slightly tart berry jam. Sticky, thick royal icing. Hollow pastry.    
  
The curse was mostly placated while they walked into nothingness, but Felix couldn’t help but feel uneasy that for the first time it made him want something he could identify as wrong. 

As they crossed into Charon territory a realization struck. There was an inn that Felix remembered from his school days- an ancient thing right off the road to Garreg Mach. It wasn’t anything special, but Ingrid and Sylvain both noted that they made some of the best desserts they’d ever had.    
  
He ticked off the positives as he realized they would hit it today if they just veered a little south. Annette would like them. This wasn’t a town, just a roadside stop. They could both use a bath more significant than jumping in a freezing river.    
  
“Hey Annette,” He said, as the road began to feel familiar in a way that made him a little nostalgic.    
  
She jumped, lost in a thought, “Yes? Do you feel something?”    
  


“No um. Do you want to spend tonight in an inn? There’s one not too far from here.”    
  
“Oh! Do you think there’s something there?”    
  
Felix felt almost too embarrassed to admit his reasoning, “Beds? Food we don’t have to hunt ourselves? I remember it from a while back. Just… Maybe one night not camping would do us some good.” 

She blushed, second guessing herself, “Sorry I think everything is curse related.” She considered his proposal with a light tap of her finger to her pursed lips. “You know what? That sounds wonderful. I know indoors isn’t so great for you though…”    
  
Felix shrugged, “One night won’t kill me.” And it would probably make her happy. That was worth a little discomfort.    
  
“Then I would love to stay in an inn! Thank you, that’s so thoughtful.”    
  
The praise went straight to his heart and he pulled up his hood, hoping she couldn’t see him blush.    
  
The Far Well Inn was the type of institution that permeated the crossroads of Fodlan- Assembled with massive crumbling stones, it stood upright out of nothing more than cold stubbornness. It had an ageless quality, it could have been built thirty years ago or in the time of Loog and no one would know any different.    
  
“Oh it’s so traditional! Do you think they have a sauna?” Annette asked, lit up with the promise of cleanliness.    
  


Felix was well aware that there was a bathhouse attached but the thoughts of  _ Annette _ and  _ bathhouse  _ crashed in his mind into a million images, each more enticing and embarrassing than the next. He said nothing at all.    
  
Annette turned in the doorway, “You coming?”    
  
He followed, feeling his shoulders tense as he entered the threshold. 

* * *

  
After sharing a tent for a week a whole bedroom felt absolutely cavernous. Two single beds were crammed into the small space, so close they could hold hands if they wished. Not that they would. While Felix could feel his patience wane with each passing second he wasn’t too proud to admit that he missed the comforts of civilization.    
  
Beds, baths, seasoned foods, not needing to sleep on edge. 

  
The distance from Annette would be good too- Felix had no trouble sleeping at night, and she was careful and quiet when she went to bed after studying- never rousing him at least. He’d begun to feel a little guilty at leaving things to her but she insisted she liked cooking, that magic required study, that the lunar nature of his curse was more to blame for his deep sleep than any measure of laziness. It was easy to relax when he had Annette to rely on. 

  
He was also starting to regret every morning that he woke after her. What did Annette look like at rest? He couldn’t imagine it but craved to fill in the image in his mind.    
  
A stupid part of him felt just the littlest bit disappointed when the innkeeper gave them a double room.    
  


Annette immediately went to bathe after their arrival. For the first time in a week, Felix was alone. It was for the best.    
  
He laid back on his narrow bed, breathing deeply as he went through the now familiar routine of taking stock of his curse.    
  
He wasn’t restless yet, though he still felt the tension running through, the wrongness of leisure. The dissatisfaction of rest.    
  
Worse though there was no  _ next step _ , no next direction. He’d spent the better part of the morning thinking about the inn, but now his mind was oddly blank. No need to be worried about  _ that _ . No new symptom was real until he presented it to Annette for analysis.   
  
Feeling aimless did not mean something happened to Annette’s father. He wouldn’t panic her with such a pessimistic attitude.    
  
Even if that’s all his mind could focus on. 

The door opened, and Annette entered with a towel around her shoulders. Red hair darkened from her bath, sticking to her neck. She was singing softly under her breath, the words mumbled but the tune clear and bright. 

Felix shut his eyes, hoping if she thought he was sleeping she might continue to sing. The door closed with a careful click, and the tune carried on.    
  
“ _ Fresh hot steam, bubble bubble. Splishy splashy, squeaky clean.”  _ Absolute nonsense yet he hung onto every word. 

The words lowered into a hum as she approached, poking him gently in the face. “Hey Felix. Come on lazybones, your turn in the bath. You don’t want to be a stinky swordsman do you?”    
  
Felix couldn’t help but frown, mumbling, “I’m not stinky.”    
  
Annette’s words felt ridiculous in his mouth and he opened his eyes to see her amused smile.    
  
“You’re a little stinky.” She leveled, wrinkling her nose. Insults had never been so appealing before.    
  
He rolled his eyes at her evaluation as he sat up and something absurd came over him. For no reason at all, Felix pulled Annette’s arm, sending her crashing into him. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her to his chest.    
  
Annette shrieked with laugher, pushing at his chest, “Hey no fair! I’m clean, don’t ruin it.”    
  
He held her just a moment longer before releasing her, something akin to joy permeating the room. Both of them smiled like goons, Annette so close to him and grinning and laughing and trying to catch her breath, face delightfully flushed.    
  
What was he doing?    
  
Felix grabbed his bag and bolted towards the baths.    
  
He replayed the interaction in his mind as he sprinted down the stairs. What had come over him? What  _ was _ that? Could he blame the curse? He probably should, that certainly wasn’t something he’d ever done before. Even wanted to. No, Felix distinctly and without fail pushed people away. Why had he… Why had he liked it?    
  
Had she? Was she just placating him because he said he’d find her father? She must be. That was all.    
  
The curse was using Annette to distract him from his actual goals. A goose chase for her father. A companion so he felt less aimless and eager to break the curse. The full moon was tomorrow and he’d hardly thought about beast hunting. Annette was a distraction and his curse was making him act recklessly for her.    
  
It wasn’t anything to do with him.    
  
He was already flushed by the time he entered the bathhouse. He dunked his head under the water as long as he could bear- trying to drown out the rapid beating of his heart with the rush of water. 

* * *

Annette was eating dessert for dinner with a huge smile on her face and a plate piled high with sweet buns. Felix chose not to comment, simply staring at her choice as he dug into his own meal with a vigor he was only mildly embarrassed by.  _ Seasoned _ food, coating his tongue in a peppery haze. He’d missed this. 

  
“They’re famous for their desserts! The chef was telling me that people come from all over so they can get their hands on all sorts of things, isn’t that interesting?” Annette said, ignoring the bit of jelly that now stuck to her cheek.    
  


Fingers gripped utensils a bit harder than strictly necessary in an attempt to resist wiping it off. He’d pushed his luck this afternoon, he shouldn’t do it again.    
  
“I recall that actually. I’m glad you’re enjoying the inn. I know all of this is hard for you.”    
  
Annette frowned, “I don’t find travel hard Felix. This is what I do, you know? Just… A little more active than usual.”    
  


He nodded, still not totally understanding what she  _ usually _ did with curses.    
  
“So what’s normal then?”   
  
Annette considered, and took a small sip of something that the barkeep said paired perfectly with her  _ dinner-  _ informing Felix he should stay miles away from it.    
  
“Well… Want to know something a little funny? Know what the absolute most common curse is?” There was something playful in her tone as she posed the question.    
  
“Bad farsight?” Felix guessed, taking a sip of his ale. Sylvain bore that one, bestowed in the aftermath of some kind of complicated breakup. 

  
She shook her head rapidly, “Nope. Most common curse I see is  _ impotence  _ of all things _.”  _ She said far too seriously.    
  
Felix sputtered, the drink in the wrong pipe, coughing up his poorly timed beverage.    
  
Voice rough, he croaked, “You’re kidding.”    
  
“I  _ swear.  _ It’s not hard to break, more of an inconvenience than anything. Ritual cleansing. Admitting wrongdoings. But I guess even the honorable soldiers of Faerghus don’t want to live with  _ that _ forever so I see it a few times a year.”    
  
Annette was grinning, seemingly pleased she’d shocked him. She had, Felix was absolutely speechless that Annette could just speak so freely.    
  
Felix stared into his now empty mug. “I’m going to go grab a refill. Um… Please tell me the second most common curse is less…” He searched for the right word.    
  
Annette laughed again, “Second most common is probably sweaty palms. Maybe clumsiness. I see a lot of horse rejection. Curses that are merely  _ annoying _ are a lot easier to cast, you know. You’re very special.” She joked, patting him on the arm.    
  
“Yeah I feel special.” Felix grumbled without venom.    
  
There was a dark haired woman sitting at the bar with a bow slung across her back- she looked foreign though her Fodlan was unaccented and perfect as Felix overheard her talking to the barkeep, “Beasts are nasty things, leave you rattled. We’re hoping to find it tonight, should help business once it’s taken care of.”    
  
His ears perked up.    
  
“Sorry did you say beasts?” Felix interrupted.    
  
She turned, giving a stare that left Felix feeling on edge. She sized him up, eyes lingering on his swords. If she knew anything about weapons, and something about her manner made him pretty sure she did, she’d note the impressive make and care. Felix should radiate competence, he worked hard to ensure that.    
  
“Who’s asking?” She crossed her arms, raising an eyebrow.    
  
His name would only make things more complicated. “Someone who’s been searching out a challenge. I’ve taken care of my fair share.”    
  
She scoffed, “Not some noble brat who’s going to run away when it starts spraying poison?”   
  
He had the scars to prove he wasn’t, in his younger days before he learned to anticipate an attack before it even happened. Beasts were dangerous, but predictable. “Never been interested in running. I have a mage with me, she’s good. You’ll regret not taking us along.”    
  
This convinced her, combat mages were in short supply everywhere. “Fine. We could use back line support. We’ll rendezvous an hour after sundown at the crossroads. I’ll take your friend. You’ll be with the frontliners I assume?” She eyed his sword again.    
  
Felix nodded.    
  
“Fine. When you get there ask for Gilbert. Tell him Shamir sent you.” 

* * *

Annette was vibrating with excitement as they packed up their gear. “We did it! I can’t believe it, the very first full moon and we found a beast!”    
  
Felix made a small noise in the back of his throat, “We don’t know that it’s lunar” 

  
“Don’t be a pessimist, the full moon is approaching Felix! If not now then when?” Annette was casting something over herself with a crisscross of sigils that made her skin glow ever so faintly before fading. Mages cast wards to increase their resistance, Felix watched people learn the skill at school but it never looked so… beautiful before. 

“I admire your optimism.” He said simply. A lunar beast would be a feat of luck even Felix didn’t believe in- Shamir had mentioned poison, it was probably a more common wild beast.    
  
Beasts of any sort were dangerous, and Annette had no experience. Fighting one in a larger group would be safer for her first time. It was considered foolish to go after a beast with anything fewer than five men. Ten plus was ideal. They’d been talking about going after a beast just the two of them. 

Experience would be good. This would not be a waste no matter what they faced.    
  
A small voice in the back of his mind told him he didn’t want it to be lunar at all- if they missed their chance this month it would be another month of travel. He wouldn’t mind another month- it wouldn’t derail his life so terribly to stay on the road. On the road with Annette.    
  
Just to find her father, of course. He’d promised her. He wouldn't break that promise.    
  
Downstairs he introduced Annette to Shamir, who repeated her instructions for how to find the frontliners. 

  
Annette shared a quick look with Felix, turning to Shamir smiling, “He’ll find the way.”    
  
Felix wished them good luck and a battle well fought and headed down the road.    
  
It was easy to hear the battalion before he even saw them, bustling around by torchlight. Several wore the familiar regalia of the Knights of Serios- odd, Shamir hadn’t worn any symbols that Felix could recognize.    
  
He stopped the first woman he saw, and she helpfully pointed him towards Gilbert. “Older guy, full armor. Can’t miss him.”    
  
He found him almost immediately, standing amongst a group of older knights. “Are you Gilbert?” Felix asked, pushing his way through.    
  
“Yes. Who are you?”    
  
Gilbert was indeed older for a knight, with long red hair streaked with grey and what appeared to be a permanent frown.    
  
This was his element. “Felix. Shamir sent me, said you could use help on the front lines. I’m as skilled with a sword as anyone here, faster too.”    
  
Gilbert eyed him, “Do you know what we’re hunting, boy?” 

“Beast. I’m familiar. I’m experienced.”    
  
The mood of the group shifted as Felix’s confidence didn’t wane. Fighting was something he could do, and do well. There was no need to be shy. Silent looks passed through the groups as they seemed to be determining if he was an idiot or actually useful.

  
“I’m not chasing glory. I have a score to settle.”    
  
Gilbert seemed unconvinced, “We do not settle scores with lupine beasts, we extinguish them like the horrors they are.” 

Felix’s heart caught at the word  _ lupine _ . He could not possibly be that lucky. Giant wolves weren’t uncommon around the full moon. They were, however, incredibly dangerous. This would be their best chance. Eyeing the regalia one more time he decided to play his hand. These knightly types liked their regulation far too much.    
  
“I graduated Garreg Mach in 1181 with an S-rank Sword Master certification and I’m better now than I was then- You’re damn lucky I showed up.” Felix grasped for his sword, trying to look as intimidating as he could.    
  
Which was pretty damn intimidating.    
  


“I’d expect a graduate of that fine institution to show a little more respect.” Gilbert criticized.    
  
“Never said I scored well in authority.” Felix mumbled- it was still heard.    
  
“Clearly. Very well, you will fight alongside the rest of us- we could use some speed in this group. You will fight by my orders and my orders alone, are we clear?”    
  
Felix wondered for a moment if he had to be the one to deal the final blow for this to be effective, and decided that he’d deal with any consequences of a selfish final strike if it came to that.    
  
“Fine. By your leave.” 

* * *

An hour after sunset the party moved. There were a dozen or so fighters lumped together in orderly groups. They began stalking the beast. Felix remembered this part of beast hunting from his youth, the careful approach, the element of surprise. Ganging up, giving it no quarter or room to move. Confusing a beast was the best way to defeat it- wolves were strong but not very smart.    
  
He’d lost track of Annette in the party, though he saw archers clustered in with a few monks. She’d be with them. Back line was safer- Annette was clever, she’d be fine. 

Wolves were mutated by the moon and grew enormous and monstrous under their light. This was it- the key to the curse. His heart thundered in his chest and he felt almost sick as they walked through the night.    
  
He’d fought them before. It was always life or death.    
  
Today it was even more important. 

The group moved in silence, with just the rustling of leaves underfoot, the clank of armor. Then an acrid fog began to fill the air.    
  
Gilbert called out, “We’re close, on your guard.” 

Felix’s senses were on edge and he drew his sword, trying not to breathe in too deeply. The ground shook under the heavy steps and an ear shattering roar grabbed his attention.    
  
A giant wolf crested through the woods, head taller than the trees. The group sprang into action “Swords on the left, axes right, lances strike first.” Commands sounded and Felix sprinted, hearing distant shouts of the other parties and the clattering of horse hooves.    
  
It was hard to see, too dark even with moonlight and the miasma that surrounded beasts made things hazy. He’d need to trust his instincts, even as his blood told him to run. Run fast. Run far. This was dangerous beyond measure.    
  
No. Felix would not run. Fear would not serve him, there was too much at stake.    
  
Battle was chaos controlled by training. When faced with something monstrous, fighters would revert to their most careless selves- Felix was anything but careless. He circled the wolf, waiting for a chance to strike as it reared back. Arrows bounced off its thick skin fired from some unseen force. Felix took a shallow breath, clutching his sword as his heart thundered in his ears waiting on a knife’s edge for the command.    
  
“Swords, forward.” The order finally called, Felix sprang into action. His blade sliced into the hide, and the Wolf turned. Its eyes glowed an unnatural yellow and their pupilless gaze focused on Felix and it reared back, roaring. Felix felt all his muscles tense, getting ready to dodge.    
  
There was no need.    
  
Something pushed it back just as it began to attack. A huge gale of wind sliced through the battlefield, clearing the smog for just long enough for the gnarled teeth of the beast to shine through as it roared in pain.    
  
Another lob of arrows distracted the beast, though still none made contact, and a lancer got a lucky shot straight through the eye with the moment of visibility.    
  
Felix held his breath as the beast exhaled another cloud of fog. It burned his eyes, and even pulling his coat over his nose didn’t keep him from coughing. He had to keep his composure. Felix tried to crouch, hoping the fog would rise above him.    
  
The beast raised a massive paw and swiped out at the axes- there was a telltale sound of metal screeching, and another round of magic attacks were fired out from somewhere off beyond the clouds. Fire this time.    
  
The beast charged forward snapping its huge jaw and Felix grabbed another soldier as he rolled out of the way. Without the line of swordsmen encircling, the wolf disappeared into the mist. Felix swore. Shit, this was bad. The wind magic was definitely coming from that direction.    
  
Annette was in that direction.    
  
More orders were called out, give chase. Puddles of black blood pooled on the ground and Felix followed as fast as he could.    
  
Breathing heavily, Felix waited until the wolf was in sight, cutting at his back legs. He could hear the calvary begin to mount their attack.    
  
The mages had made good work of the beast, bleeding heavily, littered with arrows. It had to be close to death by now. It gave another angry roar as more blades of wind followed by bolts of fire sent it flying. Circling the grounds the wolf charged again, this time at Felix though its glowing eyes looked beyond him. It reared up out of desperation, going for a leap, and Felix calculated his moment, stabbing his sword right into the belly as it was overhead.    
  
The beast recoiled as it landed, swiping a massive paw at Felix with such strength it sent him tumbling. Felix’s ears began to ring from the impact as he tried to stand up on shaky legs.    
  
It was silent, all orders and chaos of the field drowned out by the persistent ringing. None of that mattered. He knew why he was here. 

Felix needed the final strike. He would take this beast down, send it back to whatever horrifying realm it came from. There was no looking back- if he failed here the curse would win.    
  
Battles, wars, Felix would not take a loss tonight.    
  
The curse would not win with him ever again. 

He wiped his face, cut from the impact, and regrouped himself. He took a deep breath, trying to spot the archers next volley but the fog thickened and Felix let out a frustrated huff as he tried to find his bearings.    
  
No. No he would not get this close only to fail now.    
  
Felix charged forward- sword in hand, until he could feel the dark magic radiating off the beast. With a shout he stabbed the wolf in its right flank as strong and deep as he could. The wolf cried out pitifully, collapsing as another wind attack pushed it back, straight onto Felix.    
  
The last thing he saw was a mass of bloody black fur. 

* * *

Felix awoke to the distinct sour taste of a vulnerary being poured down his throat. Ugh. Artificial healing magic always left him dizzy.    
  
He supposed they killed the beast if he was still alive. That was good at least. He certainly didn’t feel any different- though he had no idea if he was supposed to know if he was free.   
  
No, a restlessness pervasive even through the pain told Felix that he was still very much cursed.    
  
It was pitch black, only faint firelight off in the distance and the glow from the moon casting everyone in silhouette. A monk knelt over him, “You took a hell of a hit. How are your ribs?”    
  
Felix tried to sit up, and felt the telltale tightness of a recently healed fracture. “Not broken.” 

  
“Good. I’m afraid I’m a bit tapped from you and some of the knights, but you should heal just fine. If you wish to travel back with us I’m sure someone could give you a proper once over back at the Monastery tomorrow.”    
  
Felix shook his head, “I’ve had worse.”    
  
Garreg Mach was not a place of warm memories, he felt no need to go crawling back to that place for something as simple as healing.    
  
A voice demanded his attention    
  
“Oh, no, you haven’t seen… Felix!” Annette rushed over with such force she knocked the Monk out of the way as she dove to kneel by his side.    
  
“What happened?” She asked, brushing her hand over the now bandaged cut on his face. It stung but he didn’t want to break the contact. He was glad she couldn’t see him, he probably looked as bad as he felt.    
  
“Giant wolf fell on me.” He explained.   
  
“Fell on you! How?” She sounded aghast, fretting over him.    
  
He cleared his throat, “Strong gust of wind blew it. I was in the way.”    
  
Annette squeaked and she pulled her hands back, “Oh no.” 

  
Felix almost smiled, “It was impressive.”    
  
This sent her into even more of a tizzy. “I hurt you? Oh no. Felix I’m so sorry. You have to forgive me. I didn’t… Oh no.”    
  
He tried to reassure her, grabbing for her hand in the dark. “The beast hurt me. Annette stop worrying. I’m a little bruised, I’m fine. It’s over.”    
  
She took a deep breath, squeezing his hand. Funny, how he was comforting her. He’d never considered himself the comforting type before. Annette was just the littlest bit calmer when she asked, “Can I get you anything, is there something I can do to help?”    
  
The monk sighed, “He needs fluids, can you run to grab a waterskin?”    
  
“Yes! Right away,” She jumped up and practically ran back into the woods.    
  
She was fine then, safe. Relief flooded as Felix followed her past the light of few bonfires in the distance until she disappeared into groups of knights

  
Everyone was taking their time to recoup, lick their wounds. It wasn’t the cleanest beast hunt Felix had ever participated in, but it wasn’t the worst either.    
  
A rattle of armor alerted Felix to another presence.    
  
“You’re either very brave, or very foolish.” A low voice said simply. Felix turned, flinching at the stickiness of his ribs. He could just make out the shape of Gilbert. He’d survived the wolf then.    
  
“I killed it didn’t I?” Felix shot back.    
  
Gilbert didn’t have an answer to that, just frowned so intensely Felix could make it out in the moonlight. He sighed and something about the tenor of disapproval felt oddly familiar, but Felix couldn’t place it. He’d spent too long being taught by knights. They were all the same.   
  
“Some of my men remembered you. You allegedly had a penchant for obscure tactics back in your school days.” This was an insult, clearly.    
  
Felix rolled his eyes, glad for the cover of night for his blatant disregard for this man’s opinion.    
  
“If you over rely on tactics you’ll get yourself killed. You make plans and then everything goes to shit immediately. I acted on your calls, didn’t break formation until the wolf broke it itself.”    
  
Gilbert cleared his throat. “Well you were an asset and I consider us blessed that we crossed paths today. Your companion, the mage, as well. Is she here? I’d like to thank her for her assistance tonight.” 

Almost as soon he said the words Annette arrived, victorious, “I found your waterskin Felix! Please drink it, all of it, the healer said you need fluids! Oh. Sorry, I don’t think we’ve been introduced.”   
  
“Oh um, Gilbert led the attack tonight. This is Annette, the mage we spoke of before.” Felix made his introduction quickly, betting Annette would be able to smooth things over. She was just more likable than he was. She’d probably stayed with formation tonight as well. 

  
Instead Gilbert recoiled with a curt “I apologize, I must go.” He backed away quickly, at a speed quicker than was strictly dignified for a knight wandering around camp.    
  
Annette collapsed next to Felix with a resounding thud.    
  
“You okay?” He asked, trying to find her in the dark. What happened? Magic exhaustion? Was something else coming? His arm looped around her shoulders and she was trembling.    
  
Felix held her- confused and completely out of his depths. Where had the monk gone? Annette was hurt.    
  
“What’s wrong?” He asked awkwardly, trying to piece together what happened to Annette. It couldn’t be guilt at his injuries- he was fine. He’d prove to her he was fine.    
  
“Felix. Felix. That… He... “ She was stammering, incoherent.    
  
Her hands grasped at the lining of his coat as if it were a lifeline. Felix tried not to panic. They were so close he could hear her heart beating out of her chest. “Everything’s fine Annette. What happened?”    
  
Annette’s voice fell to a choked whisper. “Felix I think that was my father.”    
  


No. It couldn’t have… That didn’t make sense. Even with the rush of confusion the solution seemed obvious, “So go after him.” Felix tried to help her stand.    
  
Annette clung harder, sniffling, “He heard my name and bolted. Felix. I… How could I go after him?”   
  
“Because you want answers.” Because her father owed her something, anything at all. What kind of man runs from their daughter? Even estranged? Family was complicated but Felix would never  _ bolt _ from his father even if he wanted to sometimes.    
  
She froze in place “I… Felix I can’t.”   
  


He wouldn’t push on something he didn’t understand. His first concern was Annette, before anything else, anyone else. Out of his depths he chose the only thing that ever made him feel better, action.

“Okay. We’ll stay here together until you decide what you want to do.” 

As Annette sat on the ground with him Felix tried to remain calm as his mind considered the possibilities. What was wrong? What had happened? 

  
Gilbert’s quick escape was evidence for Annette’s theory- and even in the dead of night she’d recognize her father’s voice.    
  
Why run though?    
  
The moon rose to fullness and Felix stared, knowing he’d sit with Annette as long as she needed. This wasn’t over. Not even close. Annette curled around Felix on the floor of the forest, her tears eventually subsiding into quiet shuddering breaths. Felix felt his anger grow the more he thought on what he just witnessed, not that he voiced any of his thoughts. One thing was very clear about Annette’s father.    
  
If he was a knight of Serios, he sure as hell wasn't wandering.    
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next time: Felix is distracted and angry, a terrible combination.


	5. Answers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Friends are found, fish are burnt, and answers fix nothing. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope this provides a pleasant distraction.
> 
> Going to give you the same homework I gave my students this week. Go outside, breathe, tell someone you love them, do something pointless that you enjoy.
> 
> It can all wait. 

Felix wasn’t sure if either of them slept that night. They sat huddled together on the forest floor, clinging to each other for the lack of anything to do. Victorious in battle, defeated in their goals. 

The rest of the hunting party seemed content to ignore them as they packed up their carts and began their trek back home through the woods. They left without a word of thanks or concern to the swordsman and the mage. Shamir dumped their rucksacks at their feet, gave a strange look, and walked on.  
  
Far past midnight Annette spoke, her voice wrecked from crying. “Fire. We should make a fire.”  
  
Felix nodded, shifting awkwardly. Annette was half over his legs and they’d long since devolved into pins and needles. As he tried to extract the tiny mage from his lap she clung harder and they froze for a moment before she let go with a ghost of laugh. He missed her warmth.  
  
“I’m being selfish. This must be torture for you.” Annette said quietly, trying to rub her face with her hands.  
  
Felix was taken aback. He’d not complained, had he?  
  
“It’s fine Annette.”  
  
“No, it’s really not. Still. Thank you. I must seem pretty pathetic to you with all this crying. He was right there. I feel so stupid. I should have done what you said. Gone after him. Now he’s gone again and who knows where he is?”  
  
Felix was yards away, attending one of the soldiers' abandoned fires with a bit of flint.  
  
“Garreg Mach.” Felix answered, tongue between his lips as he tried to light the damn thing.  
  
Annette wandered over, arms around herself protectively. She placed a warm hand on his shoulder and pushed him aside gently, tracing the air with a small spell that brought the fire roaring to life.  
  
“Your curse can give you specifics for him now? That’s progress.” Her tone was lighter than it should have been. Pretending. Focusing on him to ignore her own problems.   
  
“They wore the regalia of the Knights of Serios. They’re based out of Garreg Mach.” Felix explained.  
  
Annette frowned. “He shouldn’t be based out of anywhere.”  
  
So she’d made the same connection he had.  
  
“He owes you an explanation Annette.” Felix said simply. It wasn’t his place. This was not his problem to get involved with- he’d promised her to find her father, not… solve things.  
  
Felix sure as hell did not know how to solve things with fathers.  
  
Annette sat by his side again, leaning her head on his shoulder. Felix tried not to react to the contact- if touching him made her feel better it was the least he could provide. It wasn’t awful or anything.  
  
“I thought I understood. I thought one day I would find him. Show him my research and we could break the curse together and I’d bring him home. We’d be a family again. But I don’t know anything, do I? All the knowledge in the world and I can’t face him. I played it over in my mind so many times and it never went like this. He never refused to talk to me. He never ran away. When he was a knight he always told me cowardice was a sin, a broken promise.”  
  


Something sharp crystalized in Felix’s mind. Annette solved problems, she picked them apart and analyzed and researched. Her methods were great for curses, tricky complicated things that begged specifics and cleverness.  
  
Felix _eliminated_ problems. Fought and scrapped and strong armed with skill and anger.  
Felix had been a slow study on the ways of handling knights and nobles, but this was his arena much as curses were Annettes. He fought with skill when possible. He won with authority when he couldn’t. And he had a pile of authority laying in the bottom of his rucksack.  
  
“I’ll make him talk to you.” Felix said, offering no further explanation. 

* * *

“Have you been to the Monastery before?” Annette asked as the first glimpses of the grand cathedral came into sight beyond the line of the trees.  
  
They’d left at first light, taking the slowly rising run as their sign to keep moving. Felix might have slept a few disjointed hours by the side of the fire but he wasn’t sure. The dull thrum of anger reverberated through his body as they took off. The knights had somewhat of a head start but it didn’t matter. He wouldn’t let Gilbert run off again.  
  
Felix gritted his teeth, “I attended school there. It was a pointless waste of my time.” 

Felix did not want to return to Garreg Mach. In fact, he remembered this part quite clearly, on the day of his graduation he spat on the hallowed grounds of the cathedral and vowed never to return.  
  
Officers Academy. What a joke.  
  
Mostly what Felix remembered was everyone being far less concerned with actually learning anything useful and far more interested in taking tea together on the pretense of forming future alliances.  
  
That and the absolutely gaping hole in their class where Dimitri should have been. He couldn’t attend, too much of a liability cursed as he was. His secret would get out at the very least.  
  
They told everyone the young prince was simply too busy preparing for his succession after the death of his father and could not take a year away from his homeland.  
  
Dimitri was gone and Felix was perhaps the worst house leader the Blue Lions had ever had the misfortune to appoint.  
  
Felix tried to warn them that he was not well suited to the task. That he was a poor spare in every sense of the word. The world shifted and demanded Felix step up to fill roles he wasn’t capable of filling.  
  
He went through life with everyone expecting him to be Glenn. Then, at the academy, everyone wanted him to be Dimitri too. No concern was cast to who Felix was, just who he should be.  
  
 _“House leader is always the highest ranking member of any given class, Lord Fradlarius.”_ _  
__  
__“Stop. Give it to Sylvain then. The Margrave of Gautier is considered in as high esteem as any Duke.”_ _  
__  
__“Yes but the roles are quite different. The officers academy a place of tradition, order. It would not be wise to diminish the standing of your house, that would send a dangerous message to the world at large.”_

_“Diminish it, I don’t care.”_

The professors did and Felix was forced to lead. Felix could best anyone in single combat, but commanding groups did not come easily to him. The academy was a necessary evil, much as he was loathe to admit it. Trial by fire for his new lot in life.  
  
Letters from his father admonished his poor performance. Reminded him Dimitri could not fight. Felix, as his right hand, would need to be able to lead armies in his stead. More so, he’d need to make it look like Dimitri was the one doing the ordering. The academy was a microcosm of the continent, and it would not do for Faerghus to look incompetent.  
  
And so Felix leaned on what he knew. He did a great deal of dueling as class leader- the future shield of Faerghus was as mean as they came and twice as deadly. Beware any who crossed his path.  
  
No. Felix had no interest in returning to that part of his life. 

Annette sighed, “You shouldn’t feel that way about an education- learning isn’t ever a waste of time. I loved school.”  
  
Felix leveled, “I liked swordplay. I just hated tactics. And politics. And authority. My professor was an incredible fighter, I learned a lot from him.” 

“I always fancied becoming a professor one day,” something in her wistful tone implied she didn’t see that as a possibility.  
  
“No money for magical research on curses?” Felix guessed.  
  
Annette gave him a strange look, “Well I didn’t always want to study curses, you know. Cursebreaking is a singular interest. I’m grateful for it. I sought it out but...” She paused in thought for longer than Felix had ever seen her consider her words. He didn’t dare interrupt her.  
  
“I’m oversimplifying but cursebreaking chooses the mage. Cursebreaking is study of a sort but… It’s specific. You don’t add to the knowledge so much as untangle what’s already been done.”  
  
Felix could not imagine Annette doing something other than cursebreaking. Her magic the night before was incredible, powerful and deadly accurate but her mind seemed so encompassed in her study. Curses weren’t terribly interesting but Annette’s way of talking about them had a passion Felix liked.   
  
“You wished to do something else?” He asked.  
  
“I like the construction of magic, down in the core. The ruins, the sources, the tethers and draws. Felix it’s the most amazing thing in the world. Mages draw power from sources all over- think about my windchimes- they collect the wind for me and they help me cast bigger spells. What if I could make better chimes and vanes? Stronger fires for fire mages? More accurate rods for thunder? What if there’s sources for sorcery we haven’t even found yet? Music… I know there’s power in music and there’s so much out there Felix. ”  
  
Felix thought he’d seen Annette excited before. But the joy that came through her when she talked about curses was nothing compared to the beaming radiance of these ideas. His chest felt tight, seeing her so happy.  
  
“So why don’t you do that?”  
  
Annette frowned, deflated, “If I didn’t break curses, who would? It’s important work. It took me a long time to accept that this was my path but it’s valuable for more than my own selfish reasons.”  
  
Felix at once didn’t understand at all and understood all too well.  
  


* * *

The path into Garreg Mach was familiar, ancient stone steps crowded with vendors, pilgrims, all sorts of fighters. It was meant to be a place for all, open to any with good will.  
  
Felix did not have good will. Not exactly. 

Annette seemed to sense his hesitation, looking up at him with a little concerned smile, “So I know I usually let you lead but um… Do we have a plan?”  
  
Felix scoffed, “Of course I have a plan.”  
  
Sort of. He had the outlines of a plan.  
  
Annette began to spiral, her hands moving in line with her thoughts as they approached the final staircase, “Because it’s a big place you know. What if he runs away again? What if we can't find him or he refuses. You can’t just wander in and demand he talk to me”  
  
Actually, that was exactly Felix’s plan.

The moment they began climbing the stairs he was accosted by a tiny woman with thick green hair. “Felix Fraldarius. I thought that was you, but I was so sure my eyes deceived me.” Luck was not on his side today. He did not need to be waylaid by her.  
  
“Hello Flayn. It’s been a long time. How are things?” Felix said simply, ignoring the confused look Annette shot over his shoulder. Flayn hadn’t aged much in the half decade since his graduation, though her hair was arranged slightly differently. Her clothes were more suited to a woman than a child, though he’d still be hard pressed to guess her age.

  
“I am very well! Oh it is such a joy to see old friends! And new friends!” Flayn beamed up at Annette.  
  
“Annette Dominic, it’s nice to meet your acquaintance. You’re a friend of Felix?” Annette asked, smiling as her eyes narrowed evaluating. Flayn was odd, and Felix always had the strangest sense she was hiding something under the propriety- maybe Annette saw it.   
  
Flayn beamed, “Oh yes! Felix was ever so kind to me when he was a student here.”  
  
Annette laughed, “I have trouble imagining that. He’s so… prickly.” She poked his shoulder and he bristled at the descriptor.  
  
“But it is true! He did all sorts of amazing tricks to cheer me up! Have you watched him cut fruit with his sword? Or wood perhaps?”  
  
“No I haven’t had the pleasure…” Annette said, eyeing him expectantly.  
  
Great. Felix cleared his throat, trying to utilize this disruption.  
  
“Flayn I’m here to see your brother. Is he around?”  
  
“Of course! Is this official business?”  
  
Felix felt almost bad at falsifying his purpose, but this was Annette’s business. That was more important than anything Dimitri could ask of him.  
  
“Yes.” 

* * *

  
Seteth’s office was just as awful as Felix remembered. He’d been subject to far too many lectures in the cramped space. Seteth always pulled him off the training grounds for a _chat_ or to give him _advice._ Seteth was right hand to the archbishop, maybe he thought he could help Felix fill his role. He too was _odd_ and _antisocial_ . It didn’t do much to endear Felix to him, much as he was absolutely right.

  
Annette was looking around like she’d never seen a place so interesting, taking in every detail of the old structure. Felix bounced on the balls of his feet, unsure if the restlessness was due to who he was or what he bore. He didn’t want to be here one second longer than he needed to.  
  
“Felix. I did not expect you to turn up here again. I recall some rather harsh declarations to the contrary. You’ve grown.”  
  
Felix stopped the pleasantries, impatient, “I need to talk to one of your knights.”  
  
Seteth gave a suspicious look,“There are a great many knights of Serios and they have many duties. I’m not sure I will be able to grant that request out of hand.”  
  
Annette tensed beside him, giving him a desperate stare. Procedure. This would all be about procedure. If this place made him learn one thing it was how to play the games of these people- and how to win.  
  
Felix steadied himself, “I’m here on demand of the King of Faerghus. It’s crown business.”  
  
“Well. That’s certainly a surprise.” Seteth’s face remained impassive. “What business would the Kingdom of Faerghus have with the Knights of Serios? They’ve always been very reliable allies.”  
  
Felix reached into his rucksack, pulling out one of the sealed letters from Dimitri. This one was labeled with a little sword- Demanding Felix be given access as he was investigating a matter of knighthood.  
  
He handed the letter to Seteth, explaining, “Your knight is of Faerghus, and it appears he’s in direct violation of his vows to the crown.” 

The look Annette gave him could slice a sword clean in two. He would apologize later, this was necessary. This was the right thing to do.  
  
Seteth’s eyebrow raised just a smidge, “That is a very serious accusation.”  
  
“You have a knight who calls himself Gilbert, though I believe that to be a false identity. I will need to speak with him.”   
  
“And who is this?” Seteth’s gaze fell on Annette, who looked as if she wanted to bolt.  
  
In for a copper… “His daughter. She’ll be able to verify his identity.”  
  
“I see. Well, I will summon him. Would you like to wait in the Captain’s office? It’s not currently in use.”  
  


* * *

Annette exploded as Felix closed the door behind him.  
  
“How dare you! Felix how could you accuse him of something like that? And bring me into it? You… You villain.”  
  
Felix wouldn't regret what he’d said even as the tiny pinpricks of guilt began to make his stomach clench. No. Knights answered to decrees and rules, nothing else. “I said what I needed to say to get us the meeting. What would you have done?”  
  
“Explained the situation! Said I was looking for my father and…”  
  
Felix cut her off, “What if he ran again? Swore he had no child?”  
  
“So you _lied_ and said it was on the order of the king?”  
  
Felix threw his rucksack to the ground, digging angrily through it pulling out a bundle of sealed documents. “I have orders of the king for everything you could possibly imagine because it’s his fault I’m cursed. If I say it’s on orders of the king, it is and I can prove it.” 

She looked surprised, anger draining from her face almost as quickly as it came. She walked over to one of the sofas sitting down as she repeated his words, “It’s… His Majesty’s fault you’re cursed?” 

Felix swallowed. Oh. He’d told her how he’d been cursed. Who he’d been with. Shit. Maybe she wouldn't remember. 

“So your friend… the one with the curse of violence…” Annette’s tone took on a level of gravity that assured Felix she’d connected the pieces. 

Felix said nothing, staring passively at the wall and drumming his fingers on the back of the other couch. They stewed in silence, neither quite sure what to say. Felix wasn’t sure if he should apologize or be angry- neither felt quite right but he was still so on edge.

  
At last the door opened, relieving them of one fight. Bringing in a whole mess of other potential pitfalls.  
  


Gilbert walked in quietly, looking as if he’d just been handed an execution notice. Annette straightened in her seat but remained silent, anxious once again.  
  
Felix tried not to start by fighting. He’d need to act with authority if he was bringing Dimitri into this. “Take a seat. We have questions.” 

Gilbert paled, pressing his lips together in a thin line as he sat across from Annette.  
  
“Father…” Annette started and Gilbert’s gaze fell to the floor.  
  
Felix hoped he felt twice as guilty as he looked.  
  
“It’s been a very long time Annette.” He said softly.  
  
“Father… Are you…” She took a deep breath. “Father are you cursed?”  
  
He gave the briefest shake of the head. Annette sat stock still as small tears began silently trickling down her face. Felix felt sick. Nothing was good enough for this man. There was no punishment he could endure that would make up for what he did.  
  
Just as Felix prepared to yell Gilbert noted Annette’s reaction with something bordering on concern, amending “Rather, I am no longer.”  
  
“Then why are you here? Why aren’t you home with mother?” Her voice shook, “With me?”  
  
“It’s a very complicated story and you do not need to endure the ramblings of an old man. You have grown very strong, accomplished. My mages were impressed with your spell work. What need do you have of me?”  
  
Annette fell into a disappointed silence, puzzling his words. There was an uneasy stillness in the room that Felix could not tolerate.  
  
“You were a knight of Faerghus, you’ve forsaken your vows to the crown. That will not suffice as a complete answer.” Felix said sharply.  
  
“Ah. Fraldarius the younger. I did not see it last night. You look so much like your brother.” Gilbert said knowingly.  
  
Anger. Sharp, blind anger bubbled up in his chest and he grasped for a sword, “We’re not here to talk about my family. We’re here to talk about you. What were you cursed with? When?” Felix felt as if he were fighting a beast. A cold detachment came over him, focused solely on his goal.  
  
“I was given a wanderers curse in the coup of 1179. An appropriate punishment for failing my vows to protect to the late King- I could not bear to live in a Faerghus diminished by my failure and so I left. I became aware that I was cursed months later.”  
  
This didn’t make anything better.  
  
“And when did you break it?” Felix asked.  
  
Gilbert paused, choosing his words carefully. “It’s difficult to say. The curse weakens over time.”  
  
That didn’t sound correct but Gilbert did not seem the type to lie outright. Felix looked to Annette for answers.  
  
“No it doesn’t.” Annette interjected quietly. “Curses don’t weaken, not unless you meet the conditions and break the curse. They’re broken or intact. There is no in between.” Even upset as she was, shaking with fear and sadness, she was still confident in her knowledge. As she should be.  
  
“I do not understand the specifics myself. I was able to regain stillness over time. I believe the curse wore out eventually. It still lingers in ways.” The vagueness of the description made Felix ill. What did any of that mean? For Gilbert? For himself?  
  
Annette’s voice caught in her throat as she asked, “And… you never tried to come home? If you believe it’s weak why… I don’t understand.”

  
Gilbert’s stoic face answered none of the questions, “I am a tainted man. I was cursed as I failed to protect the crown, and instead of bearing my curse as a mark, I’ve broken it. My heart couldn’t even handle bearing my punishment for my failure. I am not worthy of Faerghus.” 

“But you never wrote. We’re not Faerghus, we’re your family. ”  
  
“I… What was I to say? I was an oathbreaker, I didn’t need to burden you with my own failings.” 

“Mother? Mother didn’t deserve to know you were alive? That your curse was broken? She would have come here, she would do anything to be with you again. I… Father I worked so hard to find you.”  
  
“Annette please.” Gilbert’s sternness cracked just a bit, and for a moment Felix could recognize a level of fondness, familiarity. Annette once said she loved her father, even with his leaving, and Felix didn’t understand at all. He still couldn’t but he could see the level of respect, what might be called love by someone who understood that better.  
  
Annette’s thoughts moved faster than her mouth, teetering between anger and forgiveness. “I don’t understand. You had to want to stay here. You had to _want_ to stay here. You! Why? Why here?”  
  
Gilbert let out a low noise of discontent, refusing to answer. 

"You left and I… father I just wanted you to come home.”  
  
“I cannot. Truly. I am here to atone for my failings. I don’t deserve a home.”  
  
They were going in circles, neither able to hear what the other was saying. There was a moment, in a fight, where evenly matched opponents would repeat their motions until the other tired. The victory would be one of pure stubbornness, of stamina, not skill or strength.  
  


Felix was not here to let a man bury himself in misery for ideals that meant nothing.  
  
“That’s bullshit and you know it.” Felix cut in sharply, feeling the venom in his mouth.  
  
Annette turned to Felix, the look on her face broke his heart. She was letting him destroy her. “Felix let him say what he needs to.”  
  
“No. Annette stop defending him. If you were so loyal to the crown, why did you stay _here_ if your curse broke? Why didn’t you return to Faerghus, resume your vow to the crown. Atone in service? You’ll destroy it all because you let yourself get cursed?” 

“What do you know of loyalty to the crown, with your family as it is?” Gilbert crossed his arms, narrowing his eyes and taking on a tone that was only a hair from open aggression, “You speak of the vows a knight takes when you know someone intimately who refused to honor them outright.”  
  
Felix’s blood ran cold. No. He couldn’t possibly know about that.  
  
“Stop talking.” Felix commanded.  
  
“I know what plagues the young king and your brother has the solution. He vowed his life to the crown but refuses to do his duty.” 

“You know nothing.” Felix hissed.  
  
“I know everything- you stand here on pretense of the king but I know that’s not why you’re here. Why are you troubling a ghost?” Gilbert matched Felix’s accusations with his own, stewing with a long held anger.  
  
This was not about Felix or Glenn or knighthood at all. No. Something much more important was at stake.   
  
“For Annette! For your daughter! I don’t care that you abandoned the crown but her? She’s… You have the most amazing woman in the world begging for your attention and you throw her away.” He was feeling too much at once. The anger choked but Felix could not stand to watch a father sacrifice his child for long thrown away vows. No, he’d show him. 

Annette sprang from her chair and reached for him, grasping his shoulder as Felix went to move towards Gilbert.  
  
Time slowed and Felix was able to breathe once as Annette gave him pause.  
  
His skin felt too hot. The room was too small. He needed to be anywhere but there.  
  
She was calmer than she had any right to be. “Felix, I have this. Please. You’ve done enough.”  
  
Felix frowned and tried to breathe, unable to speak any more. “I will wait outside. You will answer her questions or there will be consequences.” He let his threat linger, and left the room.

  
Felix intended to sit outside the door but his feet wandered after only a few minutes. He couldn’t hear what was being said- the door too thick or the voices too quiet. The old hallways were tight, cavernous, and he needed air or he’d go insane. He’d be able to find Annette. Annette could handle her father. He had nothing to worry about, he lied. 

"Ah… Felix.” The Professor turned a corner, narrowly avoiding careening straight into Felix with a strong elegance that Felix always admired. There was no surprise in his stoic face at seeing a long graduated student in the halls. They’d seen each other in official capacity a few times since Felix’s graduation, but never at Garreg Mach.  
  
Overwhelmed by something that wasn’t tender enough to be nostalgia Felix fell back on old habits. 

“Let’s spar.”

* * *

“It’s weaker.” The professor said, wiping his bangs out of his eyes as he sheathed his sword.  
  
“You must be kidding.” Felix said. Sure he had less time to train with his curse but he couldn’t be so much worse. He was absolutely more skilled than the last time they’d crossed swords, stronger too.  
  
The professor leveled him one of those knowing looks that made him feel seventeen years old again, “Your curse. It’s not quite as strong as it should be.”  
  
Felix wouldn’t ask where this knowledge came from. The professor always seemed to understand things well beyond Felix’s grasp, even before he was made archbishop. “Am I to believe you a cursebreaker now?”  
  
The professor shrugged. As unreadable as ever. At least the desk work had not dulled his skill in the slightest. Felix was beyond pleased to spar with the man again, each winning one quick bout.  
  
“So how do I break it if it’s weakened?” Felix asked, not expecting much of an answer. 

“Drives. Sacrifices.” As confusing as ever. He shouldn’t have expected anything- the professor loved his riddles. A waterskin was shared between the two of them and the professor spoke again, “It truly is good to see you again. You seem less angry.”  
  
Felix scoffed, “I’m twice as angry, just at different things.”  
  
The professor nodded, “Progress. You shouldn’t stay so rooted in your past. It will hold you back.”  
  
Felix rolled his eyes, “I can’t stay rooted anywhere in case you haven’t noticed.”  
  
They walked together off the training grounds and Felix felt just the smallest kernel of fondness for the man who was just as comfortable with silence as he was. Students milled about the campus, giving them a wide berth as they walked together.  
  
“I have duties to attend to, as do you I’m sure. My recommendations to you remain the same.”  
  
“Get over myself and admit I’d be half decent at magic if I tried?”  
  
The professor’s eyes widened and his lips curled just enough that Felix might be pressed to say he was amused.  
  
“Well Shamir implied you might have a tutor if that was your path. No. My advice from long ago. Decide what you’re fighting for.”  
  
With that, the professor left him.  
  


* * *

Felix circled the grounds of the monastery when he discovered the captain’s office was empty. The professor’s words stewed in his mind.  
  
What was he fighting for?  
  


Felix fought because he was good at it. Because he hated weakness in himself. Because he wanted to be the best, beyond compare or reproach. He’d never test his skill against his brother ever again, and he wanted to surpass Glenn’s reputation.  
  
On some level he fought because Dimitri couldn’t and Felix would never admit he felt he owed the king something far more important than simple deference. 

More literally, Felix supposed, the professor was telling him he’d need a reason to break his curse. It wasn’t like Felix didn’t know that.  
  
Felix didn’t care much for blind obligation. His _loyalty_ would never be enough to want to return home. No, his stomach soured as he tried to picture what he was leaving behind. Home wasn’t appealing in the least. 

In fact, if he was all that close to breaking the curse, was there truly a reason to break it at all beyond the obvious? Felix didn’t want to be cursed- his conviction that curses were given far too much weight had not wavered.  
  
He’d liked travel and fighting. Politics less so. He was far better at swords than governing or advising.  
  
In fact, even at the Monastery he hadn’t heard a whisper that Faerghus was falling apart at the seams. Felix wasn’t ever _meant_ to be the king’s right hand, he wasn’t so essential.  
  
What if he broke the curse and did something new instead?  
  
This was a new thought, an interesting and exciting possibility. He leaned against a brick wall, gazing up at the fliers practicing above as he tried to imagine other paths concretely.  
  
Curse breaking had the potential to be dangerous. Annette was skilled but he could help her with the more unsavory parts.  
  
That sounded better than returning to knights and nobles with a black mark on his reputation because he dared break a curse. Because he had all of Glenn’s sarcasm and bite with none of the charm or wit to back it up.  
  
Annette was far more motivating than any role foisted on him by circumstance. It locked into his mind pleasantly.  
  
A shred of optimism came over him before he noticed his leg was jostling impatiently. 

* * *

All roads lead to Annette it seemed. 

He found her perched on a bench outside the knights’ hall, looking marginally less angry than he’d left her. Felix was not always the best at these nuances, but Annette seemed almost deflated. Her father was nowhere in sight. A relief if he was being honest.  
  
Felix sat on the bench with her, giving her space to speak. 

“We talked. It wasn’t very helpful. He gave me these,” Annette hoisted a bundle of letters at him, several yellowed and old. Dozens, it seemed.  
  
Felix eyed them without discerning what they were- if that meant things went well or poorly. “What are you supposed to do with that?”  
  
“Read them I guess. Tell my mother he’s here, maybe. He said I could. He insists he can’t come home and I have to decide if I want that to be good enough.”  
  
It wasn’t, not to him. But Annette was different. She loved her father, or so she claimed. He wondered if she still did.  
  
“Nothing he’s said made any sense about his curse or any of it. I have no idea what I’m supposed to do now. ” Her voice caught and Felix laid his hand over her’s reassuringly. She shouldn’t cry over her father, tears would be wasted on that man.  
  
“That makes two of us.” He said.  
  
She shifted, “I mean you probably filled the condition with the beast. You kept your promise to me. You can break it now. Go back home.” Annette tried to sound happy for him, but he could tell her heart wasn’t in it.  
  
He was taken aback, explaining, “I meant I don’t have any advice for fathers. I never know what to do with my own.”  
  


A silence fell between them as Annette scooted closer to him on the bench.  
  
“You don’t need to tell me. It’s not my place… but what was my father accusing you of back there?” She asked so gently it hurt. 

Felix swallowed thickly. She shouldn’t know, it wasn’t her burden to bear. Yet everything with Annette was so much easier just for her being there. Maybe she would understand at the very least that the actions of her father had everything to do with Faerghus, and nothing to do with her.  
  
“I told you about my friend… the curse of violence.” He started.  
  
“Yes, your friend who might just be the king of Faerghus.”  
  
“Your words.” He tried not to love her little smile to his halfhearted denial. “My brother Glenn is the one tethered to him with a curse of nonviolence. The only way for either of them to be free is for them to kill the other. He had to give up his knighthood. His inheritance. Everything gone in a moment.”  
  
“That’s terrible.” She said. “But being cursed isn’t anyone’s fault. Why would that make him disloyal enough to have his knighthood revoked?”  
  
“Because he was a knight of the crown, and he vowed to give his life for the king if needed.” Felix explained, feeling his anger well up as he told her the important part. “Some advisors thought that breaking the king’s curse passed the muster of need.”  
  
Annette was shocked, “They thought the king should kill your brother? Who would suggest such a thing?”  
  
“My father.” He spat out bitterly.  
  
“Your… His own father?” Annette grasped his hand, turning to face him with sadness in her eyes, “Felix that’s terrible. No. How could he?”  
  
“The crown comes first to my father. Breaking curses is considered cowardly but they would rather the king be a coward who could fight than an uncontrollable monster who bore his curse with grace. Hypocrites, they hold up rules and tradition as a weapon for their own purpose. The only thing that saved Glenn’s life was that Dimitri didn’t have the heart to do it. Dismissed Glenn from his vows of knighthood right then and there so he’d never be obligated to die for the good of the crown.”  
  
It was easy to tell her, as difficult as the memory was. He wanted her to know, to understand this part of him. He was quick to anger because it was the only response he allowed himself to pain. They disagreed about hatred, earlier. But he did not hate lightly. Annette would understand that Felix was not disloyal. Simply that he valued so much above honor.  
  
“That’s why you don’t get along with your family.” Annette said with gravity.  
  
“Glenn’s forgiven him for it. He claims he understands why the option was presented, and that it wasn’t wrong to suggest.” Felix grimaced, “My father is disgusting, the lowest of the low. He cannot see past what is correct and honorable to do what is right.”  
  
“It’s good that the king didn’t… take the out.” Annette said gently.  
  
“I’ll never know why Dimitri refused, not really, but I am grateful he did. Truly.”  
  
Felix felt lighter at his confession and realized with warmth that he was still holding her hand. Neither of them broke the contact. It was comforting, having the honesty between them.  
  
He decided to take one more risk.  
  
“I’m not sure I want to go home when this is all over.” Felix added, going back to her original point. He could try to break his curse, but he didn’t want to. Not yet.  
  
If she didn’t understand that he’d leave it, accept her condemnation. Annette had her own past, her own hurts. There would be some other reason to break his curse- it didn't have to be her.  
  
He wasn’t so blind as to deny he so desperately wanted it to be.  
  
Annette answered, “I wouldn’t blame you. It’s a place that tried to kill your brother when he could just as easily live.” Relief at being seen flooded him. But something in her bearing made Felix nervous- there was a thought working through Annette’s brain that she wasn’t sharing. 

* * *

Annette refused to look at the letters that day. “I’m angry with him- He said I’d understand if I read these. I don’t want to forgive him right now. I know I will, though, in time. Is it so shameful to love him?” Annette asked.  
  
“You get to choose how you feel.” Felix said quietly. He didn’t have that in him, forgiveness. But it was Annette’s life, her choice. Maybe she had more sympathy for the cursed because she understood how they worked. 

“I’d like to leave Garreg Mach, if it’s okay with you?” Annette asked quietly as they purchased a cheap dinner at a cart in town.  
  
“I could tolerate a night here.” Felix said, “Don’t leave for my sake.” 

Annette sighed, “I didn’t realize I could be jealous of a place, but I am. Let’s keep moving. I know of another cursebreaker in Adrestia. We can consult with him. He’s very rude, you’ll like him. Maybe you’ll find a reason in the south.”  
  
Felix refused to admit that his _reason to stay_ was crystalizing with each day they spent together. With every passing moment his universe was narrowing around Annette.  
  
It wasn’t fair to her. He’d need to be more sure of her feelings. More time would help. 

* * *

Their next location was weeks away, demanding a trek through mountains and the valleys of the Empire. They crossed the border with ease, Felix providing papers explaining they were on diplomatic business.  
  
They spent a night in a town in Varley and Felix sent three letters. One to Dimitri, explaining the claims he’d made about legitimacy and stating his next location and an estimated date. One to Ingrid, remarking on the unfairness of time and how the Professor was as skilled as ever. And one to his father, stating that he was alive and little else.  
  
As the sun rose one morning Annette blushed as she asked the most incredible question Felix ever heard, “Would it bother you if I sang?”  
  
His heart stopped and he couldn’t help smiling. Annette’s songs still played through his mind, the bits and pieces he heard when she thought he was too distracted by something else or didn’t realize it. She always stopped when she noticed him, screaming that he was eavesdropping.  
  
“I wouldn’t mind at all. Why the sudden change?”  
  
Annette smiled back, “It’s not sudden. I was thinking, my songs have always been something really private and personal. I don’t mind sharing them with you.” 

The further he went from home, the less appealing returning felt. He spent his days on the road, distracted by Annette’s singing. The curse still lingered, pulling his thoughts far away, planning itineraries of wherever they could go after they reached Hevring.  
  
He still slept like the dead each night- his dreams of seeing Annette at rest dashed because she loved her late night projects.  
  
Research. Letters.  
  
Annette insisted in privacy as she worked through her father’s letters, and refused to discuss their contents. She claimed she could only handle one a day, that each left her more confused than the last. “I don’t know if I’m frustrated because I love knowing things, or because I don’t understand him. Maybe it’s both. Every piece of information makes it worse somehow.”  
  
One morning outside of Remire Annette seemed especially upset at what she read. For the first time, she shared what father wrote.  
  
“He wants to come home. He writes longingly of home, of my mother, me. Now he refuses? Says he absolutely can’t. It makes no sense.”  
  
“They’re the ramblings of a cursed man.” Felix argued.  
  
“I know but… He’s broken his curse yet he stands by the thoughts he had while cursed?”  
  
“He’s believing the lies his curse told him.” Felix suggested.  
  
“You don’t do that.” Annette commented.  
  
Felix wanted more than anything to believe her. 

* * *

The important thing to remember was that the river was teeming with fish. 

“I promise I don’t mean to burn dinner every night.” Annette said miserably as Felix tried to feel a tug on his homemade line.  
  
“I don’t mind burnt food. It’s better than anything I’d cook.” The sun wasn’t even set yet, they’d broken for the day early upon finding this little idyllic spot.  
  
“Burnt fish is pretty disgusting Felix, you don’t have to try to make me feel better.” She sat next to him, their thighs touching on the riverbank. She’d been touchy with him lately, the decorum of polite society behind them it felt like the most natural thing in the world to hold hands or touch shoulders. Hugs, occasionally, when she was excited or excessively pleased with him.  
  
He wouldn’t let himself dwell on the other things. Hope for anything else. Not until he told her.  
  
“I’m not saying that to make you feel better.” He didn’t just say anything, it wasn’t in his nature. He didn’t like seeing Annette upset, so he’d find more fish. It wasn’t such a difficult task.   
  
“This reminds me of the day we met, you know? Back at the river by my home.”  
  
“I remember.”  
  
“It feels so long ago even though it’s been weeks. I’m glad we met. I”m glad we got to go on this journey together. I don’t think I could have handled everything back there without knowing there was someone with me who cared.”  
  
Annette avoided talking about her father much as Felix tried not to talk of home. He still didn’t know what they’d discussed beyond the increasingly mysterious letters. He only heard the bits and pieces that bubbled out when Gilbert’s old letters were too upsetting.  
  
“You deserve so much more than what he’s given you. You don’t need to bear all the pain alone.” Fish forgotten, Felix reached for Annette’s hand. She let him, squeezing gently. Touch calmed her, he was learning.  
  
She gave him a sad little smile, “Felix I’ve been alone so long I think I’ve forgotten how to do anything else.”  
  


Felix turned to her, so much on the tip of his tongue that he just couldn’t find the will to say. This wasn’t like him- he went after what he wanted, always had. Why was everything with Annette so difficult? Why couldn’t he just tell her how he felt?  
  
Because he was sure, now.  
  
“You don’t need to be alone if you don’t want to be. You shouldn’t. You’re too…” the right word refused to come, lingering in space. He would make sure she was never alone again. That she didn’t have to bear the burdens her father was laying before her caught up in her own thoughts with no one to hear her.  
  
Annette spent so long helping others, who would help her?   
  
“I’ll be here.” Felix finished. Nothing else mattered but that.  
  
Annette leaned into his side as the river rushed by and in the moment there was only the two of them, the fading smell of a burnt dinner, and a million unspoken things.  
  
“I’m grateful for you, you know.” She said quietly. 

* * *

The second dinner attempt was more successful than the first and as the sun set that evening they settled into their usual routines. As he did every night, Felix bid Annette goodnight and laid in the tent, preparing for sleep to take him instantly.  
  
Today, it didn’t. Felix was stuck on Annette, replaying something she’d said days ago. 

_Curses controlled thoughts_ , but not his.  
  
At the time he’d let her analysis roll off his back but now it troubled him beyond reason. What was real? 

His mind went to a million places as he tried to focus. He needed to find something to do. Somewhere to go because _of course_ the curse changed how he thought. But could it change how he felt? No. Impossible.  
  
Annette trusted him. They had a steady level of comfort that was growing by the day. The curse couldn’t be causing that- it had to be real. His feelings had to be real.  
  
He trusted so little in life. Not being able to trust himself was intolerable.  
  
He resolved that the only way out of his misery would be to sleep. If he slept he wouldn’t have to question his own mind, he could just have hours of blissful thoughtlessness. He’d miss the dreamless, easy sleep if he broke his curse.  
  
When, he corrected himself.  
  
Felix examined the thought- see, he knew when it was the curse thinking rather than himself.  
  
It occurred to him, as he laid sleepless for the first time in months, that his curse might be clouding his judgement more than he realized. It made him restless, it controlled elements of his thoughts from cravings for food to interests in far off places.  
  
It did not make him angry at his father. It did not make him love Annette.  
  
The word crashed over him and he refused to correct himself.  
  
If Felix broke the curse he could be with Annette as just himself, he could see her with the clarity of his uncursed mind. He could make decisions about his future for _himself_ for the first time in his life.

  
  
Something shook, pulling Felix from his rumination. Annette knelt by his side, clutching a book to her chest, still dressed for the day.  
  
“What time is it?” Felix asked, suddenly very worried. Was there an attack? Was she okay? 

He could hardly see her in the darkness of the tent, but her voice brightened.  
  
“Felix I just realized something important. Something so important and I… It explains everything. I can’t believe I missed it- it was right there. In all the stories. In my father’s letters. Even what you’ve been saying. It all makes sense now.”  
  
He sat up, apprehensive at her excitement.  
  
“Felix. Wanderers never go home.” 


	6. Power

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Felix is forced to read storybooks and sympathize

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We're almost to the end folks!

_Wanderers never go home._  
  
It wasn’t the worst news Felix had been given in his life. Home was familiar, it had friends and purpose, sure. But home was always armor that didn’t fit quite right, and the expectation was that Felix would change to suit it, not the other way around.  
  
The reply came easily, “I don’t want to go home. If the curse leaves scars, so be it.” Felix answered, absolutely sure that it was the right decision.  
  


Annette shook her head, “No, Felix you don’t understand. Curses don’t have _lingering_ effects, not like that. They’re broken or they’re intact. There is no in-between unless the curse is designed that way.” She was alight with her discovery,  
  
He heard the words she said but nothing was connecting, “I don’t understand.”  
  
“Curses are tricky, they protect themselves. If they make the bearer believe they are cured and just don’t want to go home anymore...”  
  
Felix caught her meaning, “Then they won’t try to break it. The Wanderer will just live with their curse the rest of their life assuming they’re cured. But why go to all the trouble to live with a side effect? If it’s merely an inconvenience...”  
  
Annette held out her little black book, turning to a chart Felix had only glimpsed before. It was written in some language he didn’t recognize. He felt the smallest shred of annoyance at the discovery of another impediment caused by his apparently _tricky_ curse. 

  
“I can’t read that Annette.” Felix said simply, trying so hard not to be annoyed when she was so plainly thrilled.  
  
Annette smiled, “No you wouldn’t. It’s all shorthand. So this is my analysis of every Wanderer story. This column is the culture of origin, and _this_ column,” she pointed to an orderly series of pictures, “Is the profession of the Wanderer before they were cursed. You should be able to get the meaning, I’m not so terrible at drawing.”  
  
Felix stared, taking in the pictures. Tiny crowns interspersed with an occasional poorly drawn sword.   
  
“Royalty. They’re mostly kings?” Felix guessed, feeling on the edge of some understanding that just wouldn’t click.  
  
“Kings, princes, and very occasionally knights. Not unusual- they’re legends. But why _so many_ kings? Do you have a guess?”  
  
Felix wasn’t a king or a knight so he was an exception. Then he remembered. The curse was meant for Dimitri originally. What had Cornelia said back all those months ago before he killed her?  
  
The curse was a _solution_ to Dimitri? Why would forcing a King to wander be a solution? Faerghus notoriously had a wolf problem, Dimitri would find a beast eventually without trying. Kings would certainly have a great reason for breaking their own curses. Dimitri would not struggle to choose his people as a reason to return. The good of Faerghus was his utmost priority, always had been.  
  
Dimitri’s curse of violence did nothing for him but force him to choose his battles carefully. Glenn’s curse was far worse in some ways, he couldn’t be a knight if he couldn’t fight or wage war. But if Dimitri suddenly lost interest in home entirely...  
  
“It forces kings into exile. To stop caring about their homelands.” Felix realized, filling with a level of dread. That was diabolical.  
  
“Yes! They think their curse is broken, but that they’ve had a change of heart and they leave forever. They’re happy, they’re not searching for a solution because they _think_ it’s broken. I thought the beast cure was too simple, too straightforward. But I couldn’t find the answer at all until I read my father’s letters. The beast isn’t enough. A reason isn’t enough!”  
  
Oh. Saints. Felix finished her thought, finally catching the _trick_ of the whole thing. “Because it’s not a solution at all, it’s a trap.”  
  
“Exactly!” She looked so pleased, with herself, with him, with the inherent nastiness of the curse, “Do you know what this means Felix?” 

  
He wasn’t any closer to breaking his curse? He couldn't trust himself at all?  
  
“Tell me.” Felix answered, trying to stay in the moment, not dampen Annette's shine with his own cloud of depressing thoughts.  
  
“My father is still cursed! His letters are how he truly feels, but he insists he can’t come home. That’s why he couldn’t send them. The curse is controlling him. Felix.” Her voice broke, “It’s not over for him. For my family.”  
  
He wanted more than anything to be happy for her. And he was, in a way. But a realization came over him, cold and difficult. Annette was helping him, but her priority was her family.  
  
He steeled himself, “You have to go back to Garreg Mach.” The suggestion carried a weight that sat on Felix like a stone. He’d have to give her up, let her walk her own path. He knew now he couldn’t trust his own feelings on anything.  
  
The disappointment hurt.  
  
“No. No Felix I can’t, not while you’re like this. I’m not leaving you.” Annette grasped for his hand- her own was freezing from sitting outdoors even with the fire that cast it’s light through the open tent flap.  
  
“Annette, it’s your father. You’ve wanted to break his curse for nearly a decade- I can’t keep you from that.” He couldn't. She didn’t need to give up the thing that would make her happy to help him any longer. 

“Felix, I promised I would break your curse. I’ve done so much trying to help him, just let me help you now. Please.” She seemed sincere but Felix couldn’t believe her words. 

“Why?” He asked, desperate for her to voice words he knew she couldn’t.  
  
Annette’s voice raised, angry at his confusion, “What do you mean why?”  
  
“Why help me? Why throw away everything you’ve been working for, even postpone it? I’m no one. I just wandered into your life.”  
  
“No Felix. I… I want to help you because,” Annette stared up at him with watery eyes, words caught in her throat.  
  
“Because what?” Felix asked, hoping that he could guess her next words.  
  
If she felt how he did, then maybe it was real. Maybe he could trust one small part of himself.  
  
“Surely you know. We’ve… Felix I…” Annette blushed, looking down at the bedroll, at their still entwined hands. Felix couldn’t stand her silence, couldn’t stand to be still one moment longer on the edge of everything he wanted.  
  
Felix grasped her chin and pulled her into a bruising kiss. His senses overwhelmed with her warmth and the smell of firewood in her hair and ink on her fingers. His mind played a dozen possibilities, she’d recoil, slap him, go save her father. She’d push him away, laugh, blame his curse.  
  
But she didn’t. Instead Annette wrapped her arms around him and returned in kind. Neither of them could move away from each other. Their mouths moved frantically, saying secrets they were both too afraid to admit. 

  
Felix broke apart for air, chest heaving and blood rushing to his ears. She’d have to reply, if he told her. She’d have to admit how she felt.  
  
“Annette I,” He paused, watching her press her fingers gently to her lips, smiling, “I can go back to Garreg Mach. For you.”  
  
“Felix.” Her smile dropped ever so slightly and Felix felt unease that he couldn’t place.  
  
He needed to tell her the truth. Tell her what he wanted. She could smile if he told her.  
  
“I want to stay with you. I don’t care where. If I need a reason to break the curse or weaken the curse or let it play it’s petty tricks on me it’s you.” He wished he felt something break, but all he felt was Annette’s bittersweet promise. “I know I can do it for you.”  
  
“Felix you... Please don’t choose this lightly. There’s so much happening, you’re not thinking straight.” They were still practically cheek to cheek, her kneeling over his bedroll so he could see her eyes begin to mist as she spoke.  
  
“I don’t care.” The honesty truth.  
  
“No but you will. Felix I can’t…” The tears pooling in her eyes spilled over and as Felix went to reassure her Annette bolted out of the tent. 

Felix scrambled. He had been asleep. He rushed to dress, pulling his boots up his legs and cursing the cobbler who insisted the buckles were more secure.  
  
Stumbling out of the tent he realized Annette was nowhere to be found. Felix called for her with no reply.  
  
He reached out to his curse, but felt nothing. She must be in the woods or by the river. She couldn't’ have gone far, Felix was faster. He’d find her.  
  
He’d find out why she ran from him, what was so absolutely terrible about him choosing her.  
  
He lit a torch from the low burning fire, following the trail in the dirt as it led south.  
  
The night was clear and cold, with just a sliver of moonlight. He hoped she’d taken a torch or her lantern. Annette was clumsy in the woods, she could trip over a branch and hurt herself. They were days from the next town.  
  
He needed to find her, and called again. There was no true trail, no sound, no nothing. He kept moving.  
  
“Annette! Please!” He shouted, and at last there was a reply.  
  
A growl sounded in the woods that made Felix’s senses go haywire. He reached for his sword and realized he’d left it behind in his rush to dress. Felix dropped his torch and backed up as quickly as he could. Panicking, Felix turned, trying to find a place to hide, trying to discern what he was up against.  
  
He kept a small dagger strapped to his boot. That was it. He didn’t like his chances against any kind of beast. He ran through his options. If it was a wolf he’d be safe in a tree. But they were in Adrestia, and more likely it would be something worse. Something that could climb. Run twice as fast as any man. 

  
The beast roared again and Felix cursed himself as it came into view. A huge bear lumbered out of the woods and Felix froze, hoping desperately it wouldn’t see him. The torch cast long shadows behind the trees. He clung to his knife, willing himself to calmness, to slowing his breath down.  
  
He knew better. Men of Faerghus never wandered around unarmed. He knew better than to go off alone at night.  
  
He knew better than to confess to women he didn’t know felt the same and seemingly didn’t.  
  
Felix held his breath, willing the bear not to notice him, to just pass by and leave him be.  
  


The bear sniffed and Felix felt his lungs begin to burn. If it didn’t see him it wouldn’t charge. There was plenty of game in these woods that would be less bitter and easier to catch than Felix.  
  
Felix was always fairly certain that his stubbornness would get him killed one day but he wished he’d at least be able to put up a true fight. 

Felix tried to take a shallow breath and the beast’s head turned, beady eyes locking onto him. Maybe it would walk away. Maybe it wasn’t interested in him.  
  
The bear began to move towards him and Felix brandished his knife, preparing to attack like hell when it approached. Adrenaline coursed through his veins, and his muscles tensed in anticipation. Feeling sorry for himself wouldn’t help here. Fighting would. Skill. 

The bear began to charge but was pushed back with an unseen force, crying out in pain.  
  
Annette ran out of the woods, mouth muttering some unheard words as a sigil lit brightly through the air and another gust of wind sliced through the bear. Felix tried to spring into action, running towards her. If it charged he could be between them at least, buy her time to cast again.  
  
The bear growled low as if to threaten, but as Annette began chanting again it slunk back into the woods, limping. 

Felix scrambled for his torch, still burning low on the ground. He retrieved it, and held the light up. Annette appeared unharmed, and Felix was able to calm his beating heart just a half step.  
  
Annette approached, eyeing his knife anxiously, “Felix what happened? Did it hurt you?”  
  
He straightened, trying to look less panicked than he felt, “No. You found me in time.”  
  
“What were you doing out here anyway?” She asked, her endless frustration with him coming out once again, familiar and comforting in some way. Then her eyes dropped lower, “Are you… where are your swords?”  
  
He could feel his ears grow hot as he explained, “I left them in the tent. I ran after you.” 

She backed up half a step, deflating slightly as she whispered, “You shouldn’t have…”  
  
This was stupid. They were still in the woods. They were days from any village. They needed to be able to work together. Felix swallowed his shame, trying to be reasonable, “Annette if you don’t have feelings for me I can live with that. But don’t run off alone, it's dangerous.”  
  
“You should take your own advice. Unarmed too. Felix you’re an idiot.” Annette poked him in the chest and began walking back towards camp, leaving the first part of his statement unacknowledged. 

“I know.” Felix muttered, trailing behind her. 

He wiped his face, feeling the cool trickle of sweat pouring down his back. It was too cool to jump into the river in the middle of the night but it seemed like a half decent option. Almost dying was a decent way to put things in perspective. He could live with Annette’s concern. 

As the fire of camp came into view Annette spoke, “I’m sorry I ran off.” He wasn’t used to _shame_ when it came to Annette, but her voice wavered.  
  
None of this would do- the walking on eggshells. Felix tried to be straightforward when he could, bordering on rude. It always served him well. He’d already done the worst, there was nothing Annette could do that would hurt any worse.  
  
So he asked, tasting the awkwardness, “Can you tell me why you ran off, just so I know how we’re approaching this going forward?”  
  
Annette raised her eyebrows, “Approaching what Felix?”  
  
He felt incredibly stupid as he said, “Us?”  
  
Annette blushed from her cheeks outward and he couldn’t help but stare at her dimple as she broke into a smile. “Well apparently you’re willing to fight a bear unarmed for me.”  
  
He rolled his eyes, feeling the awkwardness pass like a summer storm, “You make fun of me for being too Faerghan and then you say _that.”_  
  
Annette laughed, and something in her joy made Felix forget to be worried.  
  
He wanted to kiss her again, but as he went to enclose the space between the two of them Annette stopped him with a hand on his jaw.  
  
“I like you Felix. I really do. Can we leave it at that for now?”  
  
Annette had to know? Didn’t she? They’d walked back to camp together, no distractions. His feelings went much deeper than simply _liking and leaving it at that_ but she wasn’t rejecting him and that was a victory.  
  
“So nothing changes then.” Felix said definitively.  
  
Annette smiled with something playful in her tone, lacing her fingers through his still unbound hair, “Well if you’d like to kiss me again, I wouldn’t be opposed.” 

Neither would he, for that matter. 

* * *

The curse _was_ weaker. Felix’s thoughts were still easily pulled in a million directions but turning back the way they went towards the Oghma mountains was no more of a struggle than training when sore. Pushing at his limits, certainly, but not insurmountable. Yes he was certainly more curious than he otherwise would be about Annette’s cursebreaker friend, about the appeals of Enbarr as a next location after that, about what Annette would do at the Opera if given the opportunity, but the thoughts were pleasant distractions rather than all encompassing needs.  
  
Garreg Mach first, her father needed to know that he was absolutely and entirely wrong. Annette deserved that much before catering to Felix’s whims.  
  
He couldn’t sense people any longer, he realized on the first day. 

  
  
Annette’s bag was caught in a bush and they were delayed, trying to untangle the straps without cutting them. To keep her from spiraling he told a story about Ingrid.  
  
Two days after her wedding she showed up to a state dinner with uneven, close cropped hair. Glenn’s terrible work, though they both insisted they loved it. The story made Annette laugh, but he no longer felt the weirdly reassuring pull that Ingrid was out there, home and safe in Galatea. 

Annette was oddly quiet that morning, maybe puzzling through the new information he could provide about the odd in-between of the Wanderer's curse. They might know his state of rest was merely an illusion meant to distract him from wanting a curse free existence, but that didn’t change the fact that they didn’t know how to _break_ the damn thing.  
  
Felix tried to remain in good spirits, as against his nature as that was, but he couldn’t help the feelings of dread that crept up at her silence. She was keeping a secret from him. He didn’t know what, exactly, but something was lingering unsaid. Annette’s response the night before played over in his mind and he just didn’t get what was happening, what was keeping her?  
  
Surely she understood he’d chosen her, he could walk back the way he came because she was walking with him?  
  


* * *

  
It began to pour as they approached Remire, the kind of thick rain that made everything bitter.  
  
“We should stay in an inn,” Felix half shouted, hoping Annette would hear him over the storm.  
  
“It’s only noon, we can’t lose half a day of travel Felix.” She replied stubbornly, gesturing to the mountains in the distance. They could reach them today if they rushed.  
  
“Annette we shouldn’t try the mountain path in a storm. We can lose half a day. Your father isn’t going anywhere.”  
  
Her voice caught, “No but… I don’t want to lose more time.”  
  
“If we get injured or lost we’ll lose even more time. Don’t push yourself too hard. I know you’re not sleeping.”  
  
“What? What are you talking about?” Annette began to blush and her tone sharpened. 

  
In a probably futile attempt not to fight, he explained, “You’re sleeping what, four, five hours a night?”  
  
“Oh.” She looked almost relieved at his accusation, “Well, some people don’t need a lot of sleep Felix.”  
  
“If you’re anxious,” He started  
  
She cut him off, “I’m not anxious.”  
  
He leveled a look, yes she was. Was there a way to keep Annette from denying whatever was happening inside her head?  
  
“Annette you will find a way to break it eventually. You don’t need to stay up reviewing your notes every night, they’re not going to reveal anything you don’t know at this point.”  
  
“You say that, but you don’t know. I’ll feel better knowing I’ve left no stone unturned.” She protested.

  
“I’ll feel better if you have a proper night’s rest. And if we don’t ruin all of our things and walk head first into a storm when there’s no reason to rush. If we stop now you can read all afternoon. Ask me all the invasive questions you want.”  
  
She huffed, acquiescing “Fine. I’m holding you to that.” 

The inn in Remire was hardly more than a shack with a few kegs of ale. The innkeeper took one look at them, soaked to the bone, and offered them a table by the fire. “I don’t want you ruining the bedding. I’ll give you a key when you’re not going to drip all over my stairs.” 

Annette had the grace to laugh, hanging both of their cloaks by the fire.  
  
Lunch was a bland vegetable stew, but at least it was warm.  
  
“My brother always said you can tell when a meal is appreciated when there’s no conversation to go along with it.” Felix said, trying to make their silence less awkward. She was upset with him, still, and he wasn’t sure exactly what nerve he’d touched.  
  
Annette raised an eyebrow, “Didn’t you say your sister in law was a bit of a glutton? I imagine she’s not terribly talkative during meals.” 

“That plus every dinner with his own family devolves into stony silence.” Felix said, instantly regretting his words as he said it.  
  
She filled the gap of his awkwardness,“Right. So um, you said I could ask invasive questions right?”  
  
Felix shrugged, “I’ve never stopped you before.”  
  
Annette hummed lightly, glossing over his tease,“So tell me what you think about _home_ right now?”  
  
Felix felt instantly annoyed, bristling, “My father is a terrible person and doesn’t deserve an heir, even if I’m cursed. He’s going to hold me breaking a curse as a black mark against me for the rest of my life. I don’t want to deal with that.” 

She studied his face, “Then what about Fhirdiad?”  
  
“What about Fhirdiad?” He shot back. That wasn’t home.  
  
Annette ignored his words, asking calmly, “You work there, right? Have business or responsibilities or _something_ that keeps you there? How do you feel about Fhirdiad?” 

Fhirdiad was full of squabbling nobles and knights who were so devoted to ideals they forgot what they were there to do.  
  
Fhirdiad had his purpose, foisted on him, of advising Dimitri who needed someone with a far leveler head than Felix if he was ever to be a truly successful King. Felix fought his battles for him, his hot temper gave Dimitri an excuse to defer. They worked together well, both completely unable to do what they were meant to do.  
  
Felix knew that Dimitri was prone to calls of war, calls to execute rather than exile, send the knights, send the assassins, send Felix. Violent solutions would always be his first reaction and it made Felix sick. Even when he didn’t voice them, Felix knew it was what Dimitri truly wanted.  
  
When it mattered, when it was personal, when it was Glenn, he’d resisted. For Glenn he’d found a peaceful solution.  
  


What did Dimitri need Felix for really? Felix was a sour natured advisor who everyone assumed was _really_ the one who called for fighting when diplomacy would do. Could he be that shield his whole life? Felix wasn’t opposed to fighting, it was all he was really good at, but _death_ was not as glorious a solution as Dimitri always seemed to think it was before someone calmed him.  
  
His father would fill his place if Felix left, and that didn’t sound good either.  
  
Unsure how to explain all of the politics of politics he grimaced, “I’m conflicted about Fhirdiad. I don’t want to go back there, but I know I’m useful.”  
  
“What do you want to do?”  
  
“Be with you” he said without thinking.  
  
Annette blushed and smiled at his sincerity, “Okay. So imagine it then. Where?”  
  
“Enbarr is interesting, I’ve been thinking about it a lot. But anywhere, really. Just not Fraldarius.” He frowned. Definitely not Fraldarius. Even if he knew that the curse insisted on it, it still felt true.  
  
Annette sighed, flipping through her notebook again. “It’s annoying, you know. There’s all these Wanderers' stories but they never truly break them. You’d think there’d be one version of the story where they completely break the curse, one tiny clue. Parts of the curse are brilliant. I’m impressed at its nature. It leads you to the solution, helps you find who you’re looking for. But then, poof, nothing. No hints at all.”  
  
“We’ll figure it out. What usually breaks curses?”  
  
“Anything at all honestly. Intent, most of all, combined with some level of power.”  
  
“Power?” That was news to him.  
  
“So the wolf drew power from the moon, there was significance in you killing it. It released power. But there are places of power, or just draws of power.”  
  
“Places of power?” 

  
“Sure. Some places naturally gather more power than others- Lake Teutates for example. Or Ailell. Someone who is cursed with being slow footed needs to break their curse surrounded by the power of wind, so somewhere like the Rhodos coast is ideal. My house would do, I have enough chimes and vanes to channel the wind. Though there’s supposed to be some ancient temple in Sreng that is an _incredible_ source of wind power.”  
  
“We could go there you know. If you’re interested.”  
  
Annette frowned good naturedly, “Now I know that’s your curse talking. Sreng?”  
  
A stubbornness came over him, “You can take a boat from the Alliance. They have trade.” 

Annette was clearly unimpressed, pointing out “I don’t think the King of Faerghus’s authority will grant us passage there, Felix.” 

“I’d find a way,” Felix said simply.  
  
Annette paused, taking in his words and reached out to hold his hand. Her fingers were freezing. “I know you would.” 

* * *

They passed the day indoors by the roaring fire, eating even more bland food and a round of ale. Day turned to night and Felix realized that he missed enjoying rest. He was always an active person, of course, but there was an appeal to leisure. There were worse things than spending a day in an inn sharpening in weapons while chatting with someone whose company he actually enjoyed.  
  
The room was far more expensive than it should have been and Annette laughed as Felix blanched at the price.  
  
Annette calmed herself just a bit, still chuckling as they climbed the stairs, “She saw your swords Felix, she knows you’re good for it.”  
  
He shouldn’t enjoy her teasing so much, “Well you could have said something if I made a stupid mistake.”  
  
Annette bumped him in the side, “Not stupid, just… you look and sound like a noble. It would be hard for you to hide it.”  
  
“I _sound_ like a noble?” Felix asked as he unlocked the door. He was preparing a defense of how many ways he’d been told over the course of his life that his speech was anything but proper but the words died on his lips as he saw where he was supposed to sleep.  
  


Felix cursed his past self as he entered the room he’d paid far too much for- for the first time on their entire journey, the inn had only one bed.  
  
There was a difference between hoping for something and actually wanting it, and Felix felt that difference bone deep.

Closeness to Annette in a tent was one thing but he’d just made her promise she’d sleep through the night. In, apparently, a bed they were going to share.  
  
“I’d recommend we both take baths but I don’t think they have one here.” Annette said, walking into the room casually, dropping her bag at the foot of the bed.  
  
“We got soaked anyway.” Felix shrugged, water was water and at least rain was clean.  
  
Annette pulled a face and Felix tried so hard not to find it endearing.  
  
Felix stared at the bed warily, “Is this okay?”  
  
“It’s just a bed Felix. Like I said, you can’t hide your nobility.” She began digging through her bag as she evaluated him. 

Felix resented her implication but took it as the dare that it was. The room provided less privacy than even a tent, he was used to being able to undress alone, climb into his bedroll, and fall asleep hours before Annette turned in for the night.  
  
Fine, if she thought he was stuck up then he could show her how _rude_ he was capable of being.  
  
Sitting on the edge of the bed, Felix started working through the buckles that adorned nearly every piece of his outer layers. Annette looked up from her bag as he started pulling his sweater over his head and made a small noise of surprise.  
  
“Felix!” She squeaked, turning to face the wall, bright red.  
  
Felix could feel himself blush despite himself but tried to pretend he was calm, “I don’t sleep in my traveling clothes Annette. What? I thought it was just a bed.”  
  
“Stop teasing me!”  
  
Absolutely not. He wouldn’t, not when she got all flustered and blushy and teased him for being too proper. It was easier to feel like the bed wasn’t a big deal when she was as embarrassed as he was.  
  
Annette walked into the corner taking her candle with her, “Don’t you dare watch me undress.”  
  
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Felix said, sliding into bed.  
  
“Turn around Felix.” He obeyed, turning on his side to face the door. He heard the rustling of cloth and reminded himself they’d been doing some version of this for nearly a month  
  
“I’m beginning to think you think this is a big deal.” Felix pointed out.  
  
“It’s not _not_ a big deal. It’s… We’ve… We’re…” She stammered, her voice growing louder as she crossed the room.   
  
“We’re what?” Felix asked quietly, hoping she’d finally say how she felt rather than letting him kiss her but just implying that he _understood_ when he so clearly did not.  
  
“We’re… You like me. We’ve kissed a lot and-” She hummed, muffling her mouth with her hands.  
  
Felix couldn’t help but find her incredibly cute as she stammered. He tried to reassure her, “We’re just sleeping Annette. It’s just a bed. I’m not going to do anything.”  
  
“I know you wouldn’t. I just,” the covers moved and the lumpy mattress dipped ever so slightly under her weight. “I’ve never done this before.”  
  
“We’ve been sharing a tent for a month. Just think of this as a smaller, softer tent.” 

She let out a huff of laughter and he turned over to face her. She was sitting up against the headboard with her notebook and the candle casting just a little bit of light. Her nightdress looked stark white in the glow.  
  
Felix stared at the book expectantly, and Annette answered, “I’m going to read a little more, I’m just really frustrated at how stuck I’m feeling.”  
  
“You promised you’d sleep.” He said as gently as he could, hoping he didn’t sound like an asshole.  
  
Something weird crossed her face, “I know what I promised.”  
  
He leaned over, placing a soft kiss against her lips, enjoying the casual contact. How each kiss meant less and less, but felt more and more comfortable and important.  
  


“Goodnight.”

Annette’s candle kept burning, and Felix let the gentle turn of pages lull him into sleep.  
  
At some point in the night Felix awoke to some noise, a particularly loud lightning crack off in the distance. He turned over, watching Annette keep reading.  
  
“Annette, go to sleep.” He mumbled, still half asleep. 

“I will.” She said mechanically, not looking at him.  
  
“No, now.” he reached over, blowing out the candle. “You’ll be a mess tomorrow if you don’t rest today.”  
  
Annette made a little noise of annoyance and huffed, laying down stiffly. He could feel the tension emanating off of her body, and kissed her cheek again before trying to fall back asleep. 

* * *

  
  


The Oghma mountains were a notoriously twisty and dangerous path, but no mere mountain would dare stand between Annette and her father. Between Annette and being right. They transversed the path in record time, though Felix was quick to point out a mudslide just off the main path on their first day.  
  
Annette scoffed, “Right right, you’re brilliant and you saved us with your superior instincts.” 

The spires of Garreg Mach once again rose in the distance and they both paused at first glance.  
  
Felix’s stomach churned. For all of this journey he’d had a picture in his mind of what he was searching for. Even as he knew that he should be pleased he could return to Garreg Mach it was overshadowed by an anxiety of the unknown. 

Annette turned to him, “My father has no excuse. He’s going to believe me. He has to.”  
  
“I’ll make him.” Felix promised.  
  
“No,” Annette straightened, staring determinedly at the spires, “I’ll make him.” 

* * *

The guards at Garreg Mach seemed to recognize them from their visit the week before, and waved them in without a second glance.  
  


Without Felix’s ability to find, and out of excuses to force with authority to find him they began to wander. Gilbert wasn’t in the knights hall. The guards by the knight’s quarters said he wasn’t off on a mission, but refused to let complete strangers into his quarters.  
  
“Where do you think he might be?” Felix asked, mentally mapping out what he remembered from his days as a student. If all else failed he could try to convince the archbishop to help him, but finding him would be a challenge in itself.  
  
“It’s been so long but if he’s not training” Annette tapped her finger against her lips, “Well, he liked to cook.”

Gilbert was not in the kitchens, though the scent of the Garreg Mach meat pies left Felix’s stomach growling.  
  
“Ah, you two.” Shamir appeared behind them, still dressed for battle even as she returned plates to the kitchen.  
  
“Shamir! Oh it’s nice to see you. Did you ever talk to your partner?” Annette lit up talking to the quiet woman, bouncing ever so slightly as she spoke.  
  
“Haven’t had a chance. What are you doing back here?” Something in Shamir’s manner made Felix stand on guard, as if he was being accused and confession was the only answer.  
  
“Looking for my father.” Annette paused at Shamir’s skeptical look, “It’s _really_ important.”  
  
“I’m sure it is. I don’t want to get involved in your family drama.” Shamir began to turn away but Annette stopped her, grabbing for her wrist. 

“It’s not _family_ drama! He’s cursed. Still. Please. I need to see him.” As Annette spoke Felix prepared to step in with harsher methods, but Shamir softened at her plea.  
  


“He’s in the cathedral. He’s been off since you were here last.”  
  
Annette leaped, wrapping her arms around Shamir, “Thank you!”  
  
Felix expected her to shove the smaller woman off, but Annette’s joy was contagious. Shamir cracked the littlest bit of a smile, but refused to return the hug out of some stubborn coldness he could tell wasn’t genuine.  
  
Annette grabbed Felix’s hand, rushing off in the other direction, “Let’s go!”  
  
“Do you know how to get to the Cathedral?” He asked dryly.  
  
She grinned as she pulled him out of the dining hall, “No, but you do.” 

The cathedral was just as grand and imposing as Felix remembered. As they rushed his body began to fill with dread. His mind filled in a million terribly boring rest day mornings where he’d have to choose between listening to what Rhea was prattling on about or about Sylvain’s misadventures the night before.  
  
It wasn’t hard to spot Gilbert, huge and ginger as he was. He towered over a pew off to the side, head bowed in prayer.  
  
Annette shrank back onto herself as she laid eyes on her father. She stood, shoulders slumped, refusing to move from the doorway.  
  
Felix hated the man, curse or not, for making Annette feel like she was anything less than the best reason in the world to not be cursed. Annette did not need her father’s approval, nor his love. But she wanted it, and deserved it.  
  
Annette shook her head, and balled her hands into fists. “Hang back. I want to do this on my own.”  
  
Felix nodded, “I know.” 

He watched Annette march over to her father, feigning confidence he knew she deserved.  
  
“Father,” she started, voice low but no less powerful.  
  
Gilbert raised his head, and Felix was shocked to see him actually acknowledge that his child was standing right in front of him. “Annette. You’ve returned.” He couldn’t hide his surprise, even as he feigned disinterest.  
  
She took a deep breath before saying firmly, “Father I need you to listen to me.”  
  
“We have nothing more to talk about.” Gilbert’s voice echoed and Felix watched Annette brighten at his refusal.  
  
“That’s what we need to talk about!” She almost laughed, “Father, you can’t even see it. You’re still cursed.”  
  
He deferred, “That’s absurd. Don’t speak fantasies. We have proof I am not.”  
  
“Then why won’t you come home?” Annette challenged.  
  
“Because I cannot. You read my letters and yet you still don’t understand?” 

“How would your letters make me understand anything other than your real feelings? Father, Wanderers don’t come home. Ever. In any instance.” Her voice tightened with frustration, at not being heard or allowed to speak. 

“Well perhaps it’s an affliction that comes from having no purpose for so long.” Gilbert refused to look at her as he spoke. Felix hated the man, absolutely hated him. But he held his vigil over the door, listening to Annette’s wishes much as he desired to intervene.  
  
“No! That’s the curse talking. Listen to me. Please, you owe me that much.”  
  
“I owe you a great deal,” Gilbert said solemnly, giving her space to speak at last.   
  
“Father the Wanderer’s curse is meant to separate kings from their kingdoms. It makes you content to live in exile. If you have any love left for me at all you will let me _help_ you and then you will _come home_.”  
  
“And if what you say is true? If I am indeed still cursed, and you find another method to break it? What then? I’ve been away for so long, there’s nothing left for me in Faerghus.” Felix averted his eyes as Gilbert’s words, because much as he hated the man who spoke them they sunk deep in his gut. This was too private of a moment to watch, too intimate. Felix avoided the same home from the same condition, he felt the aversion to home, to a place where he wasn’t meant to be.  
  
What if the curse pushed him from something he cared about? Would he sound as melancholy in his words as Gilbert sounded? As heartbroken and resigned? 

Annette’s voice answered, “You’ll have Mother. Me. Please father. Please. You can’t just give up. If you have any love for me at all, you will try.”  
  
Gilbert’s head rose and he stared at the altar. “Very well.” 

He could see Annette’s smile from the door of the Cathedral and he felt the relief flood over him. But his eavesdropping was interrupted by a familiar baritone.  
  
“Felix. You’ve returned. I’m glad to see you’re not threatening my knights any longer.” Felix turned to see Seteth standing behind him, looking almost pleased with himself.  
  
“Seteth.” Felix acknowledged, “I have no reason to threaten today, he’s seen reason.” At last, because Felix’s patience for knightly honor was only so high. 

  
Seteth sighed, “Yes. He’s a complex one. He seems content to be cursed.”  
  
Felix recoiled, “You knew he was cursed? And you said nothing?”  
  
Disgusting, Seteth didn’t even react. “I don’t get involved in such matters.”  
  
Felix scoffed, “Convenient.” And because he’d had it up to his ears in Church hypocrisy, “You always seemed to want to get involved in my business.”  
  
Again, unfazed. “Indeed.”  
  
Felix caught his meaning, annoyed, “Are you here to involve yourself again?”  
  
“I am.” Seteth confirmed, not bowing to Felix’s bitterness. He looked over Felix to where Annette and Gilbert were still speaking on the bench, “That girl, what is she to you?”  
  
So much. Far more than he was willing to admit. So he went with the simplest answer. 

“A cursebreaker.”  
  
Seteth let out a puff of air, amused, “No. What is she to _you?”_  
  
Felix was so used to others not being able to read him, or understand him at all that it felt strange for someone to see right to his core. 

  
Seteth didn’t do anything without purpose, he might be a holy man but he was as tricky as they came. This was an exchange of some kind, even if he couldn’t tell just what was being offered. Felix searched for the right words. 

  
“She’s…” he started, “A reason. A good one.” No answer at all, but the best one he could find.  
  
“You have always been odd Felix.” Seteth said, eyes lit up with some kind of far off amusement.   
  
“So you’ve said.” Felix scoffed, rolling his eyes like a teenager.  
  
“I am odd as well.” He agreed. And finally satisfied, he got to his point, “And interested in stories. You did not spend much time in the library when you were here, am I correct?”  
  
“I did not. Middling grades served me just fine.”  
  
“But you recall its location?”  
  
“Why?” Felix asked, thinking back to Annette’s home. Her talk of curse breaking and stories and the countless books cramming every nook and cranny of her home.  
  
“I’ve a book suggestion for your friend. Have you ever read _The Journey of Saint Macuil_?”  
  
“Obviously not. I don’t read that crap.” Stories about saints? He could think of nothing less interesting. 

“I recommend it. The illustrations are fairly impressive as well.” Seteth smiled and excused himself leaving Felix itching to tell Annette what he’d learned. 

* * *

  
If Felix thought Annette looked in her element talking about magic, it didn’t hold a candle to Annette in a library.  
  
She practically ran through the stacks and Felix feared for the safety of the books. And Annette. She pulled a chair out from a table and began to try to climb the shelves, her feet not quite sturdy on the rocky chair.  
  
“I can get that for you.” Felix offered, knowing her answer as he said it.  
  
“I’ve got it!” and she did, pulling a tome out from a high shelf triumphantly.  
  
_Advanced Thoughts on Reason From the Mages of Dagda._ _  
_ _  
_ “That’s not what we’re here for.” Felix said, not sure what was happening or how long he’d need to sit in a stupid library. Maybe it had a false cover?  
  
Annette clutched her book to her chest, and looked up at him with something heavy on her face, “I want you to read the Macuil book Felix.”  
  
“What?” She was the one who knew curses. Who could chart a story in some weird shorthand. He was just angry and sick of being cursed, too easily dragged around by his thoughts.  
  
He hated stories. Absolutely hated them.  
  
“I want to know what sticks with you.” She explained, but seeing his sour reaction she softened. “Read it Felix. Cover to cover.”  
  
_The Journey of Saint Macuil_ was a book so old he worried it would crumble in his hands. His worst assumptions realized, it was indeed a storybook for children, tucked into a small corner of the library meant more for the children of Knights and Professors than the students of Garreg Mach.  
  
Annoyed, but unwilling to argue, he began to read. 

_In a time long before lived a man named Macuil, who cast spells in a lush green valley._

As he finished Felix could feel Annette staring at him, as if he’d throw the book down and say “Of course! The answers!” and all would be well. As if anything could ever be that easy.  
  
“Annette you should read it if you’re that interested.” He suggested, trying to hand the book over.  
  
“I’m more interested in what you have to think about it.”  
  
“Well… Macuil is bitter and stubborn. He wants to protect the people of his valley, but gets angry with them and leaves because he can’t stand to watch them pervert his gifts.”  
  
“And?”  
  
“I don’t know. It’s a children’s story, it’s not that deep. I think it’s supposed to guilt children into obeying their parents or tell people not to go to war?” 

Annette looked so entirely disappointed in him Felix scrambled for the first thing that came to mind. 

“The last line is weird. The whole thing follows and describes Macuil but the last page seems like it’s from someone else or was added later. It’s not in the rhyme scheme.”  
  
Her eyes lit up with each detail he added, “What does it say Felix?”  
  
He tried to resist his own stubbornness that Annette’s evaluation of the book was the only thing that mattered and opened the book back up to the last page.  
  
“ _The desert was a lonely place, but his anger could not transverse borders. He’s still out there, but I’d like him to come home when he’s ready to move on. He lost the very core of his humanity, replaced with his anger. He’ll return when he creates space for it once again._ ” 

“I have no clue what to make of it.” Felix said.  
  
Annette stared at him, and then took the book. Her eyes ran along the page, reading the same lines over and over.  
  
At last she picked the book up herself and began to read from the beginning. 

* * *

The Professor stopped by the library and invited them to dine with him later that evening. “I’m curious to know what you’re working on.”  
  
Felix frowned and bit out, “You know exactly what we’re working on,” just as Annette accepted gladly, “We’d love to join you for dinner.” 

They found their way to the Star Terrace on the top floor of the main building, where the Professor had changed out of his regalia into the plain garb that Felix was fairly sure was a holdover from his mercenary days.  
  
“We haven’t been introduced, I’m Byleth Eisner, I was Felix’s teacher back in his academy days.”  
  
“Pleased to meet you, I’m Annette Dominic. I didn’t realize when he talked about his professor he meant the Archbishop of the Church of Serios!” She looked a little intimidated, but Byleth let loose a whisper of a smirk.  
  
“He talked about me then?” He asked. 

“Felix said you were the only part of Garreg Mach he liked.” Annette said, grinning.  
  
“I did not.” Felix frowned.  
  
“Yes you did.” Annette’s teasing smile calmed him and Felix couldn’t be too angry about being made to sound so sentimental.  
  
The professor had the grace to look shocked for a whole half second before answering, “I’m flattered.”  
  
They dined on a Whitefish Sautée, one of Felix’s favorites from the cafeteria- the only _sweet_ dish on offer that didn’t send Felix running back to his room for whatever rations he’d smuggled away.  
  
“Oh! I love this stuff!” Annette dug in with gusto, plainly enjoying her meal.  
  
“I have a knack for guessing what someone’s tastes might be.” The professor said and Felix almost rolled his eyes. It was far more than a knack.  
  
Annette nodded, not understanding the depth of his talents,“When I was a student at the school of sorcery I polled my classmates to find out what kinds of tastes they preferred, it’s always useful to know what people enjoy.”  
  
“You probably charted it in your book,” Felix mumbled, absolutely sure that he was correct.  
  
“Oh!” She feigned anger, “And what if I did?” 

  
“Your book?” The professor asked.  
  
Annette smiled, “I’m a cursebreaker. I like to keep track of things.”  
  
“May I see?”  
  
Annette blushed and Felix watched her fight with herself, “Oh well… it’s all in a shorthand that I’m not sure is totally understandable.”  
  
“I’m confident I’ll be fine.” There was a look that passed between the two of them that Felix could not discern- but something in their silent conversation convinced Annette. She handed her precious book over without another word.  
  
“I see,” Byleth read as he ate, ignoring the two of them for Annette’s research.  
  
Felix tried to discern an explanation of what was happening, but Annette was openly staring at the Professor now.  
  
“You missed a piece here,” he pointed to Annette’s charting of the Wanderers’ tales.  
  
Annette looked a little embarrassed, “That it’s not broken, you mean? I didn’t realize I needed the final column, I just figured that last bit out.” 

“Professor are you a cursebreaker?” Felix asked annoyed that no one had ever bothered to tell him.  
  
Byleth shook his head. “No. I’ve already been afflicted with…” He made eye contact with Annette, who had something pleading in her eyes. He stopped, collected his words, “I couldn’t be a real cursebreaker, I lack the knowledge. But as an archbishop you see things.”  
  
Annette blushed again but soldiered on, “Do you have any ideas for a solution?”  
  
He flipped another page in the book. “Macuil, that’s an interesting connection.” He said flatly.  
  
Felix blustered, hating the sense that he was completely out of whatever conversation was happening right in front of his face. Worse it was about him in some ways.  
  
“In what way is Macuil interesting? He’s not cursed. He just leaves home at the end.” Felix challenged.  
  
“Oh.” The professor stared right through Felix.  
  
Annette tried to make peace, explaining, “Well he doesn’t return home, more specifically. Felix was annoyed at that.”  
  
“I was annoyed that the story has a judgmental epilogue.” Felix replied.  
  
“All stories have judgmental epilogues. The reaction of the reader.” Byleth offered.  
  
“Yes you’re very wise. What’s the point of this?” Felix felt his patience wane and for the first time in a week he felt the pervasive need to _leave_ . His feet began to tap.  
  
Annette noticed instantly, trying to place a hand on his thigh to keep him from moving. The contact only helped a bit- a salve on the gaping wound that was his still unsolved, unbroken curse. 

“Annette, have you figured it out then? Perhaps you can help our mutual friend?”  
  
Annette swallowed the bite of food she’d picked up heavily. She traced something onto the wrought iron table, and turned to face Felix, looking less confident with each passing moment.  
  
She asked gently, “What does Macuil have to do to go home?”  
  
“Not be angry?” Felix asked angrily.  
  
He found himself on the receiving end of two disappointed looks.   
  
He tried again. “He has to forgive the humans, but he shouldn't. They started wars with magic. Started cursing people. No wonder he’s sulking off in a faraway land somewhere. Who would forgive someone for that?”  
  
He heard it as he said it and for a horrifying moment he wondered if this was how Gilbert felt when he wrote his unsent letters. His blood ran cold and he could feel himself pale.  
  
Felix turned to the professor, grasping at something he couldn’t remember. “What did you say to me before? Last time I was here? About solutions to curses?”  
  
The professor shrugged.  
  
“What did he say Felix?” Annette asked, and it shot to the front of his mind.  
  
“Curses required _sacrifices_.” Felix said with an uncomfortable finality.  
  
Annette shot up out of her chair, eyes wider than her quickly growing smile.  
  
“Oh! Oh! I understand now.” She grasped his hands, practically leaping from excitement, “Felix we need to find a place of power, immediately. Ideally a wind one, I’ll be most helpful there. Oh I can’t believe I missed it. It’s a classic technique. Sacrifices. Forgiveness. Felix I think I know how to break it. How close do you think the nearest wind source is?” 

The professor answered her theory with approving silence. Just as the professor handed the book back to Annette a gentle gust of wind passed through the terrace. 

Felix heard something he’d missed in the clattering of plates and conversation and looked up against the building, confirming what he heard was real. 

He pointed and Annette gasped.  
  
The Star Terrace was littered with lightning vanes and lanterns. There were ponds along the edge and a view of the moon as it rose. Nestled into the awning of the building was every type of power that could be channeled.  
  
Including a half dozen wind chimes. 

  
  
  
  



	7. Broken

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Curses are broken, leaving choices in their wake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We’ve reached the end! Enjoy this lovely monster of a chapter. 

Annette sprung into action, commanding Felix to move the table aside and create a clear space in the middle of the terrace.   
  
The wind picked up as Annette traced patterns on the ground, the chimes hanging off the edge of the terrace calling out forebodingly.   
  
Felix stood off to the side watching her, dumbfounded. Annette’s mind moved far more quickly than his own, he was well aware, but each unexplained action made him a bit sicker, built his apprehension. He wouldn’t interrupt her while she was casting, she looked radiant with each spell unleashed. Her hair billowed around her and the soft light of magic brightened her face.   
  
Annette’s joy was tangible, and growing with each passing second.   
  
A glowing mess of runes and magical equations was beginning to take shape with a gentle, intimidating glow on the ground. Meant for him. For a sacrifice. 

Felix was well aware curses took their costs, but this was not some overpriced room at an inn. This was… Himself. Somehow. 

How could he pay without knowing the price? Bitter as he was he knew some curses were better off unbroken. He could find contentment as he was, he didn’t need home. He didn’t need freedom, not if it took something more important from him. 

  
“Annette what is this?” Felix shouted over the wind.   
  
She looked up from where she was casting, beaming at him. She shouted back, “I’m making a power siphon, it all needs a place to go!” The wind rushed, swirling through the terrace as if to punctuate her point.

“What needs a place to go?” Felix asked, sick. 

“The magic!” She delighted, “You’ll feel this one break, trust me.” And on she went, casting more and more, the wind blowing harder so that all Felix could hear was the blood pumping through his ears and the ever present roar of the wind.   
  
“I don’t know how,” he said to himself, knowing Annette couldn't hear him. It didn’t matter, she was so convinced she had the answers to his problems.   
  
Macuil needed to forgive the humans to come home.   
  
Felix reached out to his curse, at the feelings of anger and restlessness and apprehension that plagued him, made Annette’s joy and triumph seem like a death sentence.   
  
What did he know, for fact? The curse prevented him from going home. It tied his thoughts into knots, played on his emotions. It controlled him- content to wander endlessly or settle, as long as Annette was by his side.   
  
Why would he want to go home? His father was there. The burning hatred for Rodrigue festered inside him long before he was cursed, he reminded himself. The curse did not make him hate his father. To demand forgiveness would be to demand Felix give up a part of himself, one of his core drives. His father did not care for him so much as his use- Felix carried two swords, and favored the better crafted one. He kept a spare because he was traveling and accidents happened, but the make was not as fine.   
  
It would still cut the same. A bit messier, a bit slower perhaps, but a blade was a blade.   
  
A son was a son. An heir an heir.   
  
Some part deep down beyond where the curse could touch told him that wasn’t true. Glenn was always a bit sharper because he had the charm to back it up. He was gallant, a gentleman. Glenn was the kind of man who should have been Dimitri’s right hand if simply for the fact court would like him more. 

Court not liking Felix was an asset that let Dimitri’s curse stay hidden. Felix flinched, trying to focus on the matter at hand, at Annette’s spellwork. 

Did Rodrigue deserve to be forgiven? Glenn thought so. Told him time and time again he’d been very young when the curses were cast, and he didn’t understand the weight of such things, the truth behind the vows a Knight made.

“Felix you weren’t there.”

“That doesn’t change what happened.” 

Frankly, deep in his core, Felix knew he shouldn’t forgive his father just so Rodrigue would need to bear the mark of offering his son’s life like it was nothing. Felix wanted him to live with the consequences for such a disgusting suggestion.   
  
Dimitri ruled fine with his curse- nobody thought to wait and see how it would actually change their future King, if he could find ways to manage it, to live with it just as men in Faerghus were expected to do.   
  
Rodrigue had thought too little of the prince. Too little of Felix. Felix spent the past several years of his life proving his father wrong at every step. 

Annette approached him, smiling encouragingly. She placed her lips right against his ear to be heard over the roar of the wind that circled them.   
  
“Are you ready?”   
  
Felix swallowed, “What do I need to do?”   
  
“The curse plays on your thoughts. It heightens things- your fears, your grudges, your anxieties. It centered on some to keep you in its thrall, you need to let them go. Stand in that circle with the intent to break the curse, let it take what it wants from you without a fight, and it will be broken.” She explained, and Felix watched her face drop just a little.   
  
Something in her instructions gave him pause. “Some? I thought… Just my father. What else?” He wasn’t even sure he wanted to forgive his father, wasn’t sure if he could.   
  
Annette refused to look at him, “It’s about intention. You need to be willing to move past your curse. The magic will take care of the rest if your intent is correct.”   
  
“You’re hiding something from me.” Her guilty face confirmed his suspicions, “Annette I’m not so desperate to break it that I will do it at any cost. What’s the price?”   
  
Annette leaned up and placed a gentle kiss against his lips, “I’m so sorry Felix. I shouldn’t have let this happen. I was being selfish.” 

He grabbed her shoulders, feeling her shake as she confessed. Felix looked at her guilty face and felt his chest tighten, “It’s you. It’s going to take my attachment to you.” He said, hoping desperately he’d missed something. That he was wrong. That she would recoil and call him an idiot and tell him a much simpler solution. He’d forgive his father ten times over, and gladly, if what she said wasn’t true.   
  
Annette’s eyes began to spill over, and she clung to him, “I realized… My father’s letters. He becomes overly attached to the Knights of Serios right after taking down a fire beast. And the stories, the Wanderers are always settling down with whoever they saved from their final monster. I think it heightens your feelings to convince you to stay put- to not question.”   
  
“No.” He wouldn’t believe her. He’d had feelings for her before the wolf, hadn’t he?   
  
“Felix, you can’t not break your curse for me. I’m not worth it.”   
  
“And if I say you are? I know my own mind. I know that it’s real. You know that it’s real.”   
  
“I…” She balled her fists up in the front of his jacket, “Felix you need to believe me. There are things I haven’t told you, I’ve been too scared to tell you. I couldn’t… You didn’t know how you felt. I didn’t know how you felt, not really.” 

Her reactions, her apprehensions, they all suddenly made sense. She feared the same things he did. No. The curse was part of him, but he was still a real person who existed before he was cursed.   
  
Who would exist after it was broken.   
  
“I’ll prove you wrong.” He said stubbornly, as a shocking calm came over his senses. He knew what he had to do. The sigil waited on the ground for him, bathing the terrace in an otherworldly glow.   
  
“How?” Annette shouted. The runes intensified as he approached, beckoning him with the call of magic. Of freedom. 

Felix smiled, feeling the relief of clarity, “Easy. I’ll break this stupid curse and still love you after.”   
  
The wind gathered as he entered the circle, rushing to overwhelm him from all directions. It was warm with magic and where he expected it to cut it simply brushed, soothed. Things would be okay, he needed to trust the wind, it would take care of him. 

Intention.   
  
An overwhelming sadness came up through his body and he tried to breathe, feeling his lungs catch and the wind began to pour down his throat. Air thick with magic began to fuel him and the rush made his head spin. He wanted to cough, claw at his sides, resist the foreign force that came over him. The sadness coupled with an anger that clawed from his chest- Why let the wind do this at all? It would kill him, it would take who he was away from him. He should run, fight, escape the unseen force that held him in this terrible spell.   
  
No. No. No. He needed to trust the wind. It was Annette’s magic, it would never harm him.   
  
At the thought he could feel his eyes begin to threaten tears from something other than the sting of the wind. Years of locked up emotions, things he pushed down so far that they festered in his very soul began to rise.   
  
Glenn. He missed the Glenn of his youth, the brother who was so strong, so admirable, so perfect Felix could do nothing but try to live up to his expectations. Fighting Glenn was to be cut down in a way that made you want to get better, always. He missed knowing that Glenn would be there to do the things Felix couldn’t, bare the responsibilities Felix wouldn’t need to. Try to live up to their father’s expectations of an heir while Felix got to be himself.   
  
The wind rushed again, pushing Felix off his feet, off the ground, overwhelming him entirely.   
  
Another truth he could hide from himself no longer. His father loved him. Let him be himself, be soft, be strong in his own ways long before he was simmering with anger. Let Felix stomp around court being surly and rude and only made half hearted suggestions about _peace_ and _decorum._ Much as his father critiqued, he never actually made any efforts to stop him, pull rank, remove Felix from his advisor position.   
  
Even when others suggested it.   
  
Oh. The truth felt over him, the one he’d been ignoring for years. Goosebumps broke out along despite the warmth of the wind, the magic. Rodrigue had plenty to say about Felix’s methods, but he let Felix do as he wished as long as he got results. Rodrigue never asked him to be Glenn. 

Tears spilt over as the wind rushed in his eyes, carrying the pain away. Rodrigue loved him, even if Felix wasn’t exactly who he wanted him to be.   
  
His father sent him to Fhirdiad to have his curse looked at, and recommended he search for answers at the school of sorcery. He had to know Felix would try to break the curse. And he let it happen, gave him suggestions. Even if he didn’t approve.   
  
Could Felix extend the same courtesy? The wind seemed to think so, encouraged him, carried the resentment and bitterness out of him as softly as it could. 

He could trust the wind, it was Annette’s, it would save him. 

No. Not quite. Annette wasn’t his answer, she couldn’t be, not if he let the wind carry out its business. He could reject it. He could resist, hold onto her, the happiness she made him feel.  
  
When had he ever been so happy before? He couldn’t be happy, after. Not without her. 

Intent, he heard her voice echo in his head. Felix wanted to break the curse to be uncontrolled. To have his thoughts be his own. If the curse made him love Annette as a distraction and took it away then he’d just love her again. How could he not?   
  
He could take the risk. He could trust himself. He could let the curse take whatever it wanted as a sacrifice if it left him whole, complete, and able to choose his own future.   
  
The curse had made a mistake in his thoughts, a fatal error.   
  
Felix wanted, more than anything, to be able to choose his own path.   
  
The wind grew hot with some unseen power, swirling ever faster, lifting him higher still. Then all at once it rushed in and up, overwhelming him until he needed to pull his arms up to protect himself from its force.   
  
It gusted one more brutal time climbing ever higher onto the sky. With one final gasp from Felix, it dissipated, throwing him to the ground.   
  


Felix struggled to rise as his senses returned to himself, his heavy breathing cutting through the thick silence.   
  
He tried to feel his thoughts, now confident they were at once his, and looked over to Annette. Beautiful, brilliant Annette who’s magic pulled the chains of a curse from his mind. His heart seized, staring at her worried face, and the relief at _feeling_ helped him break into a run.   
  
Annette looked shocked at his joy, but no less happy as he lifted her in his arms, kissing her and knowing the butterflies that still appeared in his stomach when he touched her were _his_ and _real_ .   
  
Annette returned his affections in kind, throwing her arms around him and resting her head against his chest, letting him get his breath back. 

Felix gazed up to the sliver of moon, wanting to give it his full ire because he’d won at last. Cornelia’s curse had now failed twice- once to keep him at bay, and one to exile Dimitri. She was dead, and she’d done nothing with her final action in life.   
  
Right? 

Ice entered his veins. Something occurred to him, something he’d been too twitchy and distracted to notice before. All at once an overwhelming dread came over him.   
  
“We need to go back to Faerghus.” He said quietly as his mind began to shake cobwebs from the part of his brain that thought about home. 

  
Annette smiled as tears of relief began to collect in her eyes, “We do?” 

  
“Yeah, there’s… I didn’t think before. Cornelia. If she was trying to get Dimitri out of the way...” he said, trying to piece together thoughts that the curse had silenced for months. The sort of thing he would have followed up on immediately if he hadn’t been so distracted.   
  
Annette’s energy turned serious, matching his intensity, “Then she was planning something. You think she wasn’t working alone.”   
  
“I need to warn them.” Felix explained, relieved she’d caught on. 

“Of course.”   
  
Sensing just the littlest bit of apprehension at her agreement he tried to be clear, “I want you to come with me.” 

“You… Do?” She asked quietly, as if still half unsure at what he felt. Still frightened the curse took him from her and he was merely pretending.   
  
He pulled back, trying to look at her, show her how he felt, “Of course. If you’ll have me.”   
  
She closed the space between them once again and demonstrated her own relief that there was nothing to be worried about- that the curse couldn’t take this from him. Something about Annette’s place in his mind felt just a little different, but she was still there. Still important. 

Annette blushed and looked away again before straightening up, determinedly opening her mouth to speak. “Felix… I need to-” 

The doors to the Star Terrace opened once again, and they jumped apart just in time for Gilbert to enter, trailing the professor. Funny, Felix hadn’t even realized he’d left.   
  
He exchanged a look with Annette, and they silently agreed, later. There were more pressing things happening. They’d need to leave hastily. Maybe they could borrow horses. Back to Fhirdiad, as quickly as possible. All _three_ of them, if Annette could produce her magic twice.   
  
If Annette’s father didn’t choose her over his stupid curse Felix would punch him.   
  
Annette approached Gilbert, lacking the nervous joy she’d had when breaking Felix’s curse. Her face steeled into seriousness as she explained, beginning to cast as she spoke.   
  
Just before the wind jumped back to life he heard her final plea.   
  
“Father, Felix is worried the King is in danger. Please let me break your curse.”   
  
“You’ve found the solution then?” Gilbert asked, staring at Felix, who nodded as if to confirm he’d already been freed.   
  
“Yes! Please, you can do it. I know you can. I’m gathering energy for a siphon.” 

The professor approached Felix, placing a firm hand on his shoulder. “What is it about your King?”   
  
“We need to leave for Fhirdiad as quickly as possible. He’s in danger. My curse was cast by someone involved in the coup attempt all those years ago. I have a bad feeling that they’re active again.”   
  
“You have a knack for sensing danger. Come, let me help you get prepared. I think the two of them deserve to do this alone.” 

* * *

They left Garreg Mach at first light on three borrowed horses. Felix didn’t miss Shamir stuffing a small tent into Annette’s pack as they prepared to leave and he almost broke out into a sweat in his relief. He hadn’t even _thought_ of that.   
  
The professor thanked Gilbert for his service, but formally released him from the Knights of Serios. Then he gave Felix a strange dagger he’d picked up somewhere as a parting gift. He whispered something in Annette’s ear that made her flinch and turn bright red as both their gazes fell on Felix.   
  
They hadn’t found time to talk in the preparations. There’d been no time to be alone to discuss whatever she was hiding from him. Now they were rushing north west as quickly as they could with her father, they’d never have privacy again. 

Gilbert stifled the energy of their traveling party, he was awkward and stern, unwilling to do more than answer vague questions from Annette with a sentence or two before falling back into silence. At least Felix was willing to ask Annette to talk when they were alone. Now it was just… painfully quiet.   
  
Felix frowned, unable to find the easy conversation that kept them both so busy and amused for weeks. She wouldn’t sing in front of her father, hushing Felix’s suggestion when he tried to bring it up.

It was a relief when their first day of travel ended and Felix began to pitch his tent, making camp for the night. Gilbert paused warily, watching Annette begin to cast her alarm spell.   
  
“What is that?”   
  
“It will alert us of danger. It’s to prevent the need to take watches.”   
  
He humphed, and went back to preparing whatever rations he’d deemed it necessary to pack for a five day journey. Felix began to pitch Annette’s tent for her, feeling acutely the loss of her closeness. Back to society then, propriety.   
  
Annette came behind him as he finished tying the last few knots, mumbling, “Sorry, I just don’t want to explain-” 

“It’s fine, your father would have every right to attempt to kill me if he knew how we’ve been sleeping. As you’ve so kindly pointed out, I can’t hide the nobility.” 

Annette laughed, “You’re kind of a rake for a noble.”   
  
“A _rake_?” Felix sputtered. He most certainly was not. She laughed even harder, clutching her sides at his offense.   
  
“Sorry, sorry. Your conduct has been perfectly acceptable.”   
  
Felix raised an eyebrow, going to hold her hand slyly, “Well I wouldn’t say that.”   
  
She hissed, reddening, “Felix!” 

“If it bothers you so much I’ll court you or whatever when we get back to Fhirdiad.” Annette’s face tightened and he scrambled to amend, “Or the coast. Doesn't matter. In case you’ve forgotten, you’re noble too. We can discuss it once I can actually sort out what’s even happening.”   
  
Annette smiled, but it didn’t quite reach her eyes, “Right. Discuss…” She trailed off, as if the words caught in her throat and Felix began to feel apprehensive once again. He loved her, it wouldn’t matter.   
  
“You still never told me what was bothering you,” Felix whispered, but he was cut off by Gilbert letting them know dinner was ready.   
  
\---

If there was one true magic in the world, it was food. Gilbert was _talented,_ even over a campfire. The ice broke just a smidge, and Annette began telling stories of her mother’s famously terrible cooking. Annette, Felix knew, was really no better- prone to burning and explosions.   
  
“It’s how we knew she’d be skilled at magic.” Gilbert laughed, discussing her penchant for letting kitchen fires grow far bigger than was necessary. It was odd to see Gilbert be anything other than dour, to watch him prepare food for his daughter and remark on her childhood favorites. Annette seemed happy.   
  
Somehow, over the course of one day, even Felix could see the Dominics were stiffly determined to be alright in the end.   
  
What of the Fraldariuses? Felix’s stomach churned, trying to imagine what seeing his father would be like. Would it just be easy? Felix had changed, chosen to move past, forgive. He was sure there was some petty thought to be had about coming home with a cursebreaker, but it didn’t satisfy. It felt pointless. His anger was not just dulled but gone completely. 

Gilbert, now free of his overwhelming guilt, seemed devoted to trying to make amends with his daughter in his own small ways. Would that be Felix? He couldn’t see himself begging for forgiveness, he still _disagreed_ with his father’s suggestion.   
  
Time would tell, he’d face his father eventually.   
  
Apologize, maybe, for the times he’d been far more terrible than anyone deserved. 

* * *

Annette claimed he’d need to give her up, that the curse would take her from him, but it wasn’t like that at all. He simply had more room in his head, all roads didn’t lead to her the way they once had. He was thinking of how he’d need to keep his new knife out of Dimitri’s hands if he didn’t want it broken, getting more annoyed by each imagined scenario as a way to distract himself for what would come in the morning. 

“Hey, Felix are you asleep?” a small voice whispered from outside. He could see a bit of lantern light and sat up, opening his tent flap to let her in. 

She looked pale, and he tried to brush some of her hair out of her face as he let her inside, “You okay? We’re going to hit Fhirdiad tomorrow, it’s going to be terrible.”   
  
She poked him, sitting on his bedroll, “Stopping a potential coup is maybe slightly better than terrible, Felix. But I wanted to talk to you about that.” Annette took a deep breath and looked up at him, glowing in the lantern’s light, “Um… I shouldn’t go tomorrow. Maybe I’ll go see Mercie, or ride onto Dominic to send for my mother. Or maybe just go home.”   
  
He studied her, feeling the nausea of worry start to creep in as he tried to puzzle together her response. This was the difference, of being cursed and not. Before his mind smoothed things, made the solutions easy. If Annette was okay, he was okay. If she wanted to be with him, that was enough.   
  
Now, he realized, his own priorities crept into play. If Annette was hurting he wanted to fix it, but he would not stand for her just giving up. She’d been hiding something from him. “What’s wrong?”   
  
She curled in on herself, “Felix I’m a cursebreaker, I can’t just walk into a Faerghus court and expect everything to be okay.”   
  
“I’ll make it okay.” He insisted.   
  
She stared at him blankly, “No. Felix it’s not that easy. None of this is that easy.” 

“Annette I told you, you’re important to me. Nobody would dare comment on your profession if I’m there,” or they’d be summarily embarrassed on the training grounds.   
  
Unimpressed, her anxiety clear, she said, “You don’t understand. Please, just listen to me.” 

If the ground weren’t typical Faerghus cold pack, Felix would be sure it was falling in. Annette’s voice was dark, serious, and it scared him. All he could manage to choke out was a small, “Okay.”

“I don’t know that this is a good idea.” The air thickened with misery, “No. I knew it was a bad idea back in Adrestia but you kissed me and I got carried away.”   
  
Unwilling to accept anything she said he grasped for information, focusing on the least terrible part of her statement. “The night you ran away from me?”   
  
“Yes. I have feelings for you but,”   
  
“But what? What could possibly… We broke an unbreakable curse. You broke two unbreakable curses. Annette you are incredible and if anyone has something to say about you then-”   
  
“Felix I’m cursed.” She whispered, blinking away tears.   
  
Of all the things in the world it could have been, this was half a relief, “So we’ll break your curse. We’ll go to your friend in Adrestia.” He tried to wrap his arms around her, wipe her tears away, but she pushed him off. 

Her voice was shaking as she tried to stammer out an explanation, “The curse is part of being a cursebreaker. It’s the knowledge. I- I can’t be a cursebreaker without it.” 

“Huh.” That made sense, actually, “Annette plenty of people live with their curses, you’re from Faerghus, it’s more common than not.” He still couldn’t understand her response, why she was so upset. None of it seemed too concerning. She seemed fine.   
  
She shook her head, and at last looked up at him with an alarming panic.   
  
“I don’t sleep Felix. Ever. I gave it up. That was my sacrifice, for my knowledge.”   
  
A million things clicked into place. Her morning routines, her late night study sessions, her _bed_ way back in her home. Of course, of _course_ she didn’t sleep.   
  
Why keep that a secret? She had more hours in a day, that was hardly anything to be ashamed of. She had enough energy without it.   
  
He mumbled, “Well now I feel stupid.” He thought back to the last night at the inn when he _insisted_ she sleep and cringed, “You should have just told me.”   
  
She swallowed, shocked by his nonchalance, “How? When it means I’ll…”   
  
She dissolved into tears and Felix realized he hadn’t gotten the whole of it. This time she didn’t shove him off as he went to hold her, wrapping his arms around her for lack of anything better to do. He let her calm for a moment before he asked, “You’ll what Annette?”   
  
Annette took a gasping breath and her voice broke as she confessed, “I’m going to die. I don’t just get the time back, I lose it. A third of my life will just be gone. You can’t be with me like that.”   
  
His blood ran cold as she spoke of her death. The rational part of his brain came to life. The part that tried to stay calm, protect, see the things others did not because they were too concerned with everything other than the truth, that part of his brain gave him the cold clarity he was famous for wielding. Annette was going to die some time off in the future. But why shove him away for that? Why not enjoy the bits of life she got to have? Death was part of life, she was building it up too much in her head.

“Who says I can’t?” He asked stubbornly. 

Annette looked aghast, “Felix don’t be silly. We’re the same now but I’ll age faster, die faster. When you’re 60 I’ll be 90!”   
  
He tried to picture it, being old with her, and the only thing he could respond was, “You’ll get even shorter.”   
  
She cried out, frustrated “Felix! This isn’t funny.” 

And it wasn’t. Truly it wasn’t. She’d been hiding this from him for weeks. She was afraid to tell him. She was afraid to be with him.   
  
“I know.” He responded, not letting her go.   
  
The beauty of not being cursed anymore meant he could trust himself when he said, “We can find a solution. It doesn’t change how I feel.” 

Annette looked at him, eyes red from crying, “What if I don’t want there to be a solution? I’d lose my knowledge. I’d lose the ability to break curses, without people like me…”   
  
He wouldn’t stand for pointless self sacrifice if it made her this miserable, “But there are others. The professor said he wasn’t a cursebreaker, but I have a hunch about Seteth.”   
  


His words gave her pause, and her eyes narrowed as she said definitively, “Seteth is not a cursebreaker Felix.”   
  
He challenged her, “How do you know? He sent me towards the book.” Seteth being a cursebreaker would actually make quite a few things make sense. Hell, Garreg Mach was apparently a place of power in itself, there had to be a cursebreaker somewhere in residence.   
  
She puffed out her cheeks, frustrated, “Ugh… Look I’m probably not supposed to share this kind of thing but he stinks of magic so old that I wouldn’t be surprised if he were _immortal_ . And I’d like to figure out exactly what that curse is but if I give up my curse then I can’t. I won’t ever be able to. See. I knew you wouldn’t understand.”   
  
While Felix was sure he would need to unpack that piece of information for days, he focused on the matter at hand. 

“I don’t.” He agreed, “I don’t understand but I recently stopped holding a decade long grudge on a matter of life and death and I’m not looking for a new one.”   
  
It was Annette’s choice to break her curse or not, to love him or not. But he wouldn't be the barrier to her. He knew what it was like to choose a life that was less than ideal. Life wasn’t easy, purpose wasn’t easy. 

  
She kissed him, softly, and murmured against his lips, “I love you.” His heart caught, she hadn’t said it before. She’d been holding the words back from him, too wrapped up in her own secrets.   
  


“Make your choices for yourself.” Annette’s face began to drop so he added, reverently, “I’ll love you regardless.” 

She stayed, sitting crossed legged on the floor of his tent. He fell asleep with her fingers stroking through his hair. 

* * *

  
  


The last time Felix saw the gates of Fhirdiad there had been a disturbing finality to the sight. Now they beckoned him, comfortingly mundane.   
  
Even without heraldry or banners Felix was a familiar enough character at the gates that they were let through without a question. Though he heard the whispers pass through about his companions. Both Dominics flinched whenever a too loud whisper provided _vanished, cursed,_ or worse, _Gustave_. 

Annette and her father trailed behind Felix’s maneuvering, Annette worried, Gilbert half annoyed.

  
Felix was well used to exploding into the palace, and it didn’t raise any alarms from the stablehands or staff when he leaped off his horse and took a running start into the castle.   
  
He raced through the narrow corridors, knowing Dimitri’s typical schedule enough to know he was probably in his study. No one would stop Felix from entering the private quarters of the king. Courtiers and servants hailed him as he passed, remarked on his long absence, Felix ignored them all.   
  
He opened the door without knocking, “Boar, I need you to listen.”   
  
Three shocked gazes fell upon him and Felix froze.   
  
Of course. Of course he’d be here.   
  
Dimitri, who’s shock was quickly fading into delight, spoke first, “Felix! Does your presence mean what I think it means?”   
  
He found his voice, trying not to feel overly touched by his friend’s joy at his return, “Yes. Not that it matters- we need to discuss Cornelia.”   
  
A look passed between the others in the room, who Felix was trying his very best to ignore in favor of saying what he actually needed to say. One thing at a time.   
  
“Of course.” Dimtri nodded, giving him room to speak.   
  
“We’re to assume you’ve been freed then?” Rodrigue asked, unable to help himself, and Felix looked to him with wide eyes, shocked at the absence of tension as he responded calmly, “Yes.”   
  
No, this wasn’t the point, Felix cleared his throat and spoke, “The Wanderers curse is a curse intended to exile.”   
  
“Well we should feel blessed you managed to vanquish it.” Rodrigue stated, and he looked almost relieved to see Felix.   
  
“It was intended for Dimitri.” Felix reminded everyone, trying to find a voice for the worries that plagued him since he got his mind back. It was difficult to find the words for a gut feeling.   
  
“His Majesty has already been cursed, and we are quite lucky it seems that information had not spread to those that would intend to harm him. Cornelia did not know of Dimitri’s curse, meaning those who afflicted it have been killed.” Rodrigue reminded him, trying to maintain order through reassurance.   
  
“What if she wasn’t working alone?” Felix asked and Dimitri coughed as air caught in his throat.   
  
“We killed her. There was no one else with her. I would have killed them. She had to be working alone.” Dimitri gripped the edge of his desk and Dedue’s usually impassive face lined with worry.   
  
Felix steadied himself, “Then how did we get rumors? She was remote, isolated. It was a trap. If she failed, there will be more where she came from. She could not possibly be working alone.”   
  
Rodrigue disagreed, “We eliminated everyone who was involved with the coup. We’ve had spies searching for years for anyone who escaped, who was associated with them. We collected her belongings, burnt her cottage down. She was the first rumor we heard, and we took care of her.”   
  
“The first. Not the last. They’re active again, I know it.” Felix crossed his arms and stood his ground, already sliding back into old habits.   
  
“How?” Dimitri asked and Felix watched as his expression darkened, his thoughts began to turn to something Felix was unwilling to probe.   
  
It didn’t matter, the truth was more important than keeping Dimitri momentarily calm, “Because exiling a king is useless unless one seeks to take _advantage_ of that fact.”   
  
The room fell into silence as Felix’s words took weight. Then, a knock on the door, “Your majesty, Lord Fraldarius’ companions.”   
  
Dimitri was too caught up in a cloud of something so Felix answered in his place, “Let them in.” 

Gilbert entered first and the tension of the room broke into something unrecognizable.   
  
“Sir Gustave.” Dimitri brightened at seeing a ghost and rose to greet his long lost teacher.   
  
“Your majesty, it has been a very long time. I apologize for my absence.” Gilbert bowed, and as he straightened he was once again the picture of a knight.   
  
“It is very good to see you Gustave.” Rodrigue greeted politely through his abject shock.   
  
“Your Grace.” Gilbert greeted, and Felix watched as Annette peeked out behind her father.   
  
“Who is this?” Dedue asked, noticing her.   
  
Felix went to answer but Gilbert beat him to the punch, “My daughter. It is her we have to thank for my presence, as well as your son, your grace.”   
  
Dimitri seemed to have some level of recognition, walking over to greet her, “Annette, right? I heard a great deal about you from your father as a child.”   
  
Annette’s eyes widened in shock at his greeting, craning her neck up to look at Dimitri, “Oh. No. Surely nothing good.”   
  
“All amusing.” He smiled genuinely, “Thank you, for returning Felix to me.”   
  
“You’re very welcome.” Annette bobbed into a shallow curtsy, and Felix shifted uncomfortably- hating being discussed as if he were a missing pet. Noticing his frustration, she laughed, “Or I’m sorry. Depends on how he acts.”   
  
Rodrigue’s lips curled up at her joke, but said nothing. 

* * *

The day passed by in a blur of strategy. Royal mages brought forth the materials collected from Cornelia’s hideout, and indeed, it seemed like she was corresponding with _someone._ No one had been able to translate the letters before, but Annette could read them at first glance. Felix glanced over her shoulder, recognizing the same shorthand she used in her book.   
  
“Your daughter is well educated, Sir Gustave.” Rodrigue whispered as the mages exited, gaping in confusion.   
  
“She is singular.” He replied, shifting somewhat uncomfortably at the mention of Annette’s skillset. Cursebreaking was still taboo, this was still Faerghus. This could ruin a family’s reputation all together.   
  
“It’s Nabatean _,_ the language of curses.” Annette provided brightly, going back to the letters. 

Rodrigue’s eyebrows raised at her honesty and Felix snorted. As long as Rodrigue didn’t say anything he’d let him have his bias. He’d enjoy a repaired relationship with his father for the course of an hour before he ruined it again.   
  
They discussed security, potential weak links, information from each of the slowly translated letters.   
  
Working with his father had never been half so easy. Now he could hear the suggestions and strategy for what they were rather than blinded by who suggested the plans. Dimitri’s secret needed to be kept. Eyes would need to be everywhere in court, in the countryside. The inner circle was still considered trustworthy, but they’d need to keep an eye on anyone known to be close to Dimitri. Just in case. Strong links could be weakened.   
  


They broke off eventually, with a Steward greeting them to let them know rooms had been prepared for the Dominics. Felix gave one look to Annette, who was painstakingly translating the letters and documents. They all agreed to reconvene at dinner, and Annette glanced knowingly at Felix, saying, “I’ll have them done by morning.”   
  
He left the office with Rodrigue, heading back to the suites set aside for the Fraldariuses. 

  
They weren’t ten steps down the hall when his father asked, “Miss Dominic, we can trust her?”   
  
Felix nodded, “Yes.” 

Felix’s answer shocked him, “To be honest, I expected you to bite my head off at that question.” 

“Why?” he asked, knowing the answer. 

He treated delicately, “You seem to have a,” Rodrigue paused, suggestion in his delivery, “Connection with the young woman.” 

Felix swallowed, and again felt some internal shock at how _not_ annoyed he was with his father. Even so, he increased his pace. He was a man, nearing a quarter of a century, he would not _blush_ in front of his father.

“Cursebreaking requires knowledge of curses. She doesn’t cast them herself.” He answered, ignoring his father’s implication. Rodrigue hadn’t dismissed Annette’s presence out of hand, which was a good sign of his willingness to tolerate unusual methods as long as they worked. 

Catching on to Felix’s unwillingness to talk about Annette, Rodrigue focused on his son, “You seem calm.”   
  
“I came in yelling of another coup. I am anything but calm.”   
  


It felt wrong to outright tell Rodrigue what had come to pass, what he’d sacrificed in exchange for his freedom. Felix knew he had things to apologize for, and owed his father far more of an explanation than he was willing to give. But seeing his father smile good naturedly at Felix’s surliness was no longer a sickening, bitter sight. It meant there was progress.   
  
He’d left his anger behind. He just had to decide what would take its place. 

* * *

One specific downside of Fhirdiad, in addition to the everything of the situation, was that it was strictly impossible for him and Annette to be alone.   
  


Firstly, because they were incredibly busy unpacking all of Cornelia’s plans.   
  
Secondly because Felix was the heir to a Duchy, and though Annette had no title of her own her father was a knight and that was noble enough for people to have certain expectations. Propriety, namely.   
  
They hadn’t taken enough advantage of travel. He missed her, missed casual contact, missed the easy affection that could come from simply being close. Even holding her hand or standing directly next to her was a risk in some fashion. 

He was changing for dinner, another annoying inconvenience, when a knock sounded on his door. He paused, waiting for the interruption. 

Silence. Odd. 

He cracked his door open with the beginnings of apprehension to find Annette standing in his doorway, beaming.   
  
“You’ll never believe who showed up.” She was bouncing on her toes, plainly thrilled to share whatever great news she had.   
  
“Who?” He asked, genuinely clueless.   
  
“My mother! Apparently the archbishop wrote to her when we left Garreg Mach, saying my father would be returning to Fhirdiad and she should join us!”   
  
“Your… Mother?” He clarified. She lived in Dominic, she’d left Fhirdiad after Annette graduated school. Gilbert had left her in 1179, and she just… came?   
  
Annette nodded eagerly, “Yes! And she and my father are talking _right now_ .”   
  
Wait. As happy as she was, why come get him? Why not stay with her newly reunited family? “And you’re not talking with them?” 

Annette opened her mouth, and then closed it silently. Felix understood not having the right words, and he ushered her inside.   
  
“Annette what happened?”   
  
“She’s excited to see him. My mother burst into tears and kissed him and he was shocked, absolutely frozen, and then he kissed her back and apologized and it was…” She was tense, each word happy but with some underlying sense of distress.   
  
Felix tried to fill in, from her description, “It sounds romantic I guess?”   
  
She wrinkled her nose, “I mean it’s still a little gross. They’re my parents.”   
  
“That I do understand.” Not that he had any true memories of his parents together, he hardly remembered his mother at all. But imagining Annette’s father kissing anyone sounded uncomfortable. 

Annette fell into an armchair, pulling her hair out of her face as she worked through her next thought. She looked almost ashamed as she explained, “I want it to be fairytale and easy and it’s not.”   
  
“What’s not?” Felix sat beside her, unsure how to help with anything other than his own awkward presence.   
  
“My father.” She sighed deeply and Felix realized what she’d been circling around, “He’s sorry, I can tell that he’s sorry but I’m still mad at him for leaving. Even if he had a good reason.”   
  
“You’re allowed to be angry Annette. Breaking curses doesn’t fix everything that was broken.” He frowned, marveling at the Dominics’ stubborn insistence on moving forward. At pretending. He wouldn’t forgive Gilbert that easily if it were his own family.   
  
Which, he supposed, was part of what got him in this situation in the first place. 

“You’re getting along with _your_ father.” She accused.   
  
And he was- somehow. There was an awkwardness to their interactions as they relearned how to talk to one another when Felix did not spit venom in every response. They were still fundamentally different people and they disagreed quite a bit.   
  
It just was easier now. All of it.   
  
He turned to Annette, beginning to recognize how she liked to reflect back to him when she didn’t want to talk about things. Her eyes cast to the ground, and she was still half curled into the chair. He could take some focus, get her out of her own head. He explained, “I don’t hate him anymore. It’s a start.” 

She smiled encouragingly, “You’re good at this, you know?”   
  


“At what?” Certainly not talking to his father.   
  
“You’ve watched me work for the last month, I’ve never seen you do this… Right hand of the king stuff. You’re good at it. His Majesty listens to you, you’re not afraid to disagree with people. You get to the heart of the issue. It’s kind of like cursebreaking.” 

Compliments were always uncomfortable, but Annette’s were somehow even worse, “I guess.”   
  
She continued her praise, “I’m glad you’ve come home. I’d be sad if the curse took this away from you. I didn’t even realize what you’d lost. That you cared.” 

  
And he did care. Dimitri was his king, sure, but he was also his friend. Protecting someone who mattered was a task well worth undertaking, in Felix’s mind. It was odd, how easily he slid back into his life when for months he was so easily convinced it was a punishment.   
  
Control over his own mind demonstrated how deeply the curse had burrowed.   
  
“It’s all thanks to you.” He said honestly. 

She paled, “Right. Thanks to me. And my cursebreaking.” Her voice caught and Felix realized his misstep.   
  
“We don’t need to talk about this right now.” This was the first time they’d been alone in a week, there was no need to ruin a precious stolen moment of privacy with actually deciding what they were going to do. That could be future Felix’s problem. They had a coup to deal with first. A king to protect.   
  
Annette smiled sadly, choosing a new topic, “I want to go home and get my books and things. My weathervanes. I could climb up on the castle roof in a windstorm but I’m having trouble channeling proper magic out here.”   
  
“You’d fall.” He pointed out, cringing at the thought of her up on the roof of the Castle.   
  
“Probably.” She agreed, “So safer if I go home.”   
  
He tried not to be overly disappointed, much as his younger self was crying out at the thought of her absence. He grinded his teeth together, “So that’s it then? You’re leaving?”   
  
Her eyes widened in surprise, “What? Felix no, I’m not.” She rose from her chair and deposited herself in his lap as if to prove her point, “I’m going to come back here. Live with my family, at least for a while.” 

Annette didn’t _sound_ insane as she spoke of her plans, “You’re going to take up residence as a cursebreaker in Fhirdiad?” 

She shrugged lightly, “Well, why not?”   
  
“You know why not.” Because it would make her a pariah. Besmirch the honor of her already dishonored family. Make the thing she loved to do ten times more difficult. 

She gave him a long suffering state and paled. “I know. Can I pretend that this is easy? Have a little while with you and my family reunited and the magic that I’ve worked so hard for?” 

She deserved that. It wasn’t fair, the ways Annette was being forced to choose, “You can,” He couldn’t help himself, “But not if it will make you miserable.”   
  
Her head dropped, hair covering her face as she mumbled, “I can’t see myself doing anything else.” 

He tucked her hair behind her ear, suggesting the thing that seemed to make her happiest, “What about magic?”   
  
She looked confused, “I already do magic.”   
  
He tried to think, remembering a week ago when he’d hung onto every single word she said,“No… sources. The uh, chimes. Music.”   
  
Something passed over Annette’s face that made Felix want to kiss her. 

She looked at him finally, leaning in closely, “I’ll think about it when I’m traveling. Unless… You want to come with me?”   
  
The idea was beyond tempting. Even with horses it would take them nearly a week to go to the Rhodos coast and back. They could be alone. They’d have the freedom to be just as they were. Longing for a time when even thought was controlled and calling it freedom was absurd- yet he wanted to hold on to it, indulge one last time.   
  
He couldn’t- Cornelia’s letters were proving Felix’s worst nightmares true.   
  
There were more lurking in the wings.   
  
His father once told him a bond forged in war would one day have to adjust to hold in peace.

A bond formed of wandering, it seemed, was similar. They wouldn’t break for having curses broken. 

  
He placed a hand on the small of her back, relishing the warmth, “I’m sorry, I need to stay here.”   
  
Bittersweet, Annette rested her head against his shoulder, saying gently, “No, I know. You’re right. I’ll miss you, we haven’t been apart in all the time we’ve known each other.” 

“I will manage, but only temporarily.”   
  
Decisions made, Felix chose to take advantage of their momentary privacy. 

* * *

  
Annette’s absence burned and Felix did what he did best, kept busy. The training grounds were a familiar friend, as comfortable in their harshness as any cozy room.   
  
It didn’t satisfy. Nor did spending endless days watching Dedue pretend not to fret over Dimitri, a terrible cycle of nervousness and unspoken concern. Affection disguised in cups of tea, terribly spicy foods, and flowers carefully chosen for their calming scent.   
  
Dedue could keep Dimitri from his worst tendencies in a way not even Felix could, but he knew very little of politics. Plots were not the domain of a retainer. That duty fell to Felix.   
  
His father, for once, was the clearest head in the room as they attempted to piece together what they might possibly be up against.   
  
Dimitri made an offhand comment about how his father had been known, occasionally, to consult with a cursebreaker- and he now understood the utility. Rodrigue patted him on the shoulder, saying fondly, “Your father was known to be a radical by some measures.” 

Dimitri’s eye danced with mischief, “Well, luckily your son is _eccentric_ in ways I have never been brave enough to be.”   
  
The remarks on his relationship to Annette had worsened in her absence. It was not so hard to endure commentary that one missed someone they loved- Felix tried not to deny things that were plainly true.   
  
But there was an enduring itch, worsening with every suggestion about him and Annette.   
  
When he could stand it no longer, he cornered his father in the privacy of the Fraldarius suites. 

  
Felix crossed his arms uncomfortably, allowing his pride to bend in a way that it never could before, “I need your council.”   
  
Rodrigue looked up from his correspondence, “I would be glad to give it.” The plain joy on his face at Felix’s request unleashed a torrent of guilt. He dug his heel into the ground, willing himself to just say what he needed. 

He cut to the point, “If you’d known you were going to lose Mother so quickly, would you still have married her?”   
  
Of all the things in Fodlan, this was clearly not the question Rodrigue was expecting. His surprise disappeared into thoughtfulness, and he tapped his finger against the parchment lightly.

“I’m not sure how to answer. Why do you ask?” 

Felix shifted under his scrutiny. Annette’s secrets were her own. “I can’t tell you. But you never remarried. You loved her.” 

Rodrigue looked almost wistful, “I did. I couldn’t bear the thought of remarrying, even as the advisor's suggestions became, well, aggressive.”   
  
“I didn’t know that.” Felix said. He always thought of his father as by the book. He’d never considered him _rebelling_ against an expectation.   
  
“No, you wouldn’t. By the time you or Glenn were old enough to be involved with such things it was well known I was stubbornly content to have one brief and happy marriage.” Rodrigue’s gaze focused from the middle distance of memory, and back to his son. “To your question, I would have appreciated the time I had with your mother more had I known it would be so short.” 

Felix knew this, of course. He’d never truly considered not being with Annette, even if her curse could cut her life short. That was her anxiety, her need to push him away because things could not live up to her version of perfection.   
  
A small, selfish part of Felix thought about telling Annette he wanted her to break her curse- to live, to find something else to do. Not because cursebreaking wasn’t a worthy or valuable endeavor, he understood just how important it was, but because the pain of knowing he’d lose her was too much.   
  
Still, watching his father still lovesick for his wife, gone twice as long as they’d ever been married, gave him some measure of courage.   
  
Annette might return with answers but they didn’t matter. Not really. 

* * *

  
  


The Dominics resumed their residence in the Lion’s square, occupying a grand townhouse that overlooked the famous statue marking the quarter.   
  
The small back garden was decorated in Annette’s _eccentricity_ \- dozens of windchimes and weathervanes marking it the home of a powerful mage. Rumors began to swirl that the King of Faerghus had hired a cursebreaker as a royal mage, and much as everyone publicly tutted and scoffed at how _vulgar_ of a choice that was, privately was another matter all together.   
  
Privately, Annette had no small amount of callers begging for the cure to an inconvenience.   
  
“Hypocrites.” Felix scoffed as Annette went through who’d been by to see her that week. Notably, a Count who could not stop dropping hints that his daughter was looking for a match despite Felix’s known association with Annette.   
  
She’d helped him with his curse, because she was Annette and breaking curses was what she did.   
  
“I’m the hypocrite.” She mumbled.   
  
“No, you’re not.” Felix said sharply, taking a sip of the tea she served. Too sweet, far too sweet, even without the three lumps of sugar Annette added to her own.   
  
Annette frowned, “I walk around breaking curses but I won’t even consider breaking my own. Felix, what am I supposed to do?”   
  
He tried to be calm, reasonable, “What you’re good at. I’ve told you, it changes nothing.” 

They’d had this argument at least once a week since Annette returned to Fhirdiad. It was circular, well treaded paths that led nowhere. Changing nothing. Did she want to give up cursebreaking? No. Did she want to die early? No. Did she want to break her curse? Maybe.   
  
“What’s your opinion? You keep saying it changes nothing, you love me regardless, a short time is better than no time at all.” True, he had. Annette hummed out in frustration, “But you don’t ever tell me what you _think_ Felix.”   
  


Felix ignored the sickness that curled in his stomach, “What do you want me to tell you? I don’t want you to die.” Annette nodded sadly, and he added, “I don’t want you to give up curse breaking if you love it. But there are other things you can do.” 

Annette shifted uncomfortably, picking at some kind of pastry Mercedes had dropped by at her last visit, “It’s all I can think to do, truly. I know there’s other things to do, I know I’d enjoy it. I just… can’t. I can’t see myself spending my life doing anything else. I know I don’t want to die but I… Felix it’s so hard.” 

  
  


“I understand.” And he did, even if he didn’t want to. But something felt off in her explanations. Her words rang like a hollow bell. The noise was there, but they lacked something to make them sing. 

Annette traced her fingers along the edge of her saucer, “What is it like? You wanted so badly to leave, now you’re here. You’re… advising. Sitting still all day.”   
  
“I’m still training.” Contrary for the sake of it.   
  
She laughed, sighing out an exasperated, “Felix.”   
  
He took another sip and winced, it really was _terrible_ tea, “The curse controlled my thoughts. It made some options more tempting, and some far less. I’m only realizing the extent as I live normally. Like you said, it…” and it hit him like a ton of bricks. Annette speaking of breaking curses sounded just like her Father, insisting he couldn’t come home.   
  
“What?” Annette asked at his pause.   
  
He leaned forward, “Annette… What’s your reason?” Felix felt himself break into a grin as he became more and more sure he was correct.   
  
“What are you talking about?” Her brows furrowed skeptically, confused but catching on to his joy.   
  


Look at him, figuring something out before her. 

  
“You told me I’d need a reason to stay, that my curse would trick me, tie my thoughts into knots. What’s your reason to live?” 

Annette dropped her teacup and it landed on her saucer, cracking both as she realized what he was asking. She looked at him, smiling as tears gathered into her eyes and she gasped out, “You.” 

* * *

Annette was glorious in sleep. Her hair took up more space than a woman who was barely five feet had any right to occupy. She snored, tossed, turned. She was a vicious blanket thief, rolling with a grip Felix could not hope to break.   
  


When Felix woke shivering, or to nonsense mumbled phrases that put her songs to shame, or to an arm suddenly flung right in his face he couldn’t be annoyed. No, he was a lovesick fool who would stare affectionately at the terror in his bed.

Annette could sleep however she wanted. She deserved all the rest in the world. 

It ended with a moment of calm, Felix rearranging his limbs so he could hold her and just feel Annette breathe, warm and still as he joined her at rest. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And she’s done! 
> 
> This was a 1AM note on my phone back in October that I was convinced I wasn’t going to write. I don’t write plots. I don’t write adventures. I definitely don’t write fight scenes. 
> 
> It stuck in my head. It grew and I outlined and scripted and wrote a tiny bit at a time. It was going to end up in the fridge with all my other half-assed long fic ideas. 
> 
> By Thanksgiving I had three chapters of what would become this weird little adventure.
> 
> I talked about the rules of the universe with my very sweet and patient husband and realized the final twist of the story standing in line in the snow to buy pickles.
> 
> I’m still a little obsessed with this universe, so I’m not sure I’m done with it entirely. Feel free to ask questions (ie: Why don't you just cast a minor curse to prevent a major one from being cast? Because you need true hatred in your heart to curse someone, it cannot be done protectively.)
> 
> But for now, I’m going to go drink a big glass of wine and write about some post-canon married people talking about their feelings. As is my way. 

**Author's Note:**

> Multichapter adventure let's go! 
> 
> I hope you enjoyed!


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